Latest / Reformed Thinking / The First Seminary: A Biblical Case for Pastoral Training
Transcript
- 0:00Welcome to Reformed Thinking. I am your host and looking at
- 0:03the stack of documents on the table today, I have to say I am
- 0:06feeling a mix of intimidation and excitement.
- 0:09That is usually the right emotional cocktail when we
- 0:12tackle theology. Good to be here with you.
- 0:14Before we crack open the books, we need to do a little
- 0:17housekeeping on who we are. We aren't coming at this from a
- 0:20neutral, view from nowhere perspective.
- 0:23We are two Protestant Christians.
- 0:26We are specifically, we hold to the Westminster Confession of
- 0:29Faith. Right.
- 0:30So for the listener who might be new to that term, it means we
- 0:33believe that God is sovereign over all things, that Scripture
- 0:36is the final rule for faith in life, and that grace is the only
- 0:40reason any of us are sitting here.
- 0:41We like our theology thick and we like our history dusty.
- 0:44But today we are asking a question that feels very modern,
- 0:48almost almost bureaucratic. We are talking about training.
- 0:51Sounds dry when you put it that way, training, but it is
- 0:54actually a matter of life and death for the Church.
- 0:56The specific question on the docket is this is the idea of a
- 1:00seminary. You know, the formal school, the
- 1:03degrees, the professors, the Ivy covered brick buildings.
- 1:07Is that actually in the Bible or did we just invent it in the
- 1:10last few centuries because we like credentials?
- 1:13It is a valid challenge. If you scan a concordance for
- 1:15the Word Seminary, you will come up empty.
- 1:18It is not there. So does that mean it is
- 1:20unbiblical? Just a man made tradition?
- 1:23To figure that out, we have two main sources for this deep dive.
- 1:26First, we are looking at an article called The First
- 1:28Seminary by Nathan Busnitz, which is actually a chapter from
- 1:32a book called Biblical Missions. That is going to give us our
- 1:34historical anchor and our biblical exegesis.
- 1:37And then, because we don't want to stay in the ivory tower, we
- 1:40have a transcript of an interview titled Intentional
- 1:42Discipleship in Lebanon. This features a missionary, Mark
- 1:46Jeffries, and a local Lebanese believer, Maurice Boutros.
- 1:49So the plan is to connect the dots from the Reformation in
- 1:52Geneva all the way back to the Apostle Paul in the 1st century,
- 1:56and then land the plane in modern day Beirut to see if the
- 1:59model holds up. It is a lot of ground to cover
- 2:02and frankly some of the math we are going to do later regarding
- 2:05the Apostle Paul schedule and made me want to take a nap just
- 2:08reading about it. It is exhausting just to think
- 2:11about, but let's start with the history.
- 2:13When we talk about our theological heritage, usually
- 2:16all roads lead back to Geneva. John Calvin, the man, the myth,
- 2:21the theologian. People usually think of Calvin
- 2:23as a writer. They think of the Institute's or
- 2:26they think of him as a preacher. But we often miss that he was,
- 2:30at his core, an educator. The source material pinpoints a
- 2:34very specific date, June 51559. A significant Monday in the
- 2:39history of the church. Tell me about the scene.
- 2:41What was happening in Geneva on that day?
- 2:43John Calvin was dedicating a new building.
- 2:45This was the inauguration of the Geneva Academy.
- 2:47Now you have to wipe away the modern image of a university
- 2:51dedication. This wasn't a bunch of wealthy
- 2:53donors drinking champagne and cutting a ribbon.
- 2:55What was the vibe? You have to remember the Geneva
- 2:57at this time was essentially A refugee camp.
- 3:01The Reformation was sweeping through Europe, but the counter
- 3:04reaction was violent. If you were Protestant in France
- 3:07or Scotland or the Netherlands, you were target.
- 3:10You could be imprisoned, you could be burned at the stake.
- 3:12So people were fleeing to Geneva for safety.
- 3:15Right. The city was packed with
- 3:17displaced people, traumatized people, and in the middle of
- 3:20this crisis, Calvin decides to build a school.
- 3:24The source brings up the structure of this school.
- 3:26It wasn't just one thing. It was 2 tiered.
- 3:28They had the college, which was for the youth, basically getting
- 3:31them up to speed on reading, writing, and general education.
- 3:36But then they had the scholar public, the seminary.
- 3:39This was specifically for training pastors.
- 3:41There is a detail in the text about where the building was
- 3:44located. It says it was built only a
- 3:46short distance from Calvin's Church, Saint Pierre.
- 3:49That geography tells you everything you need to know
- 3:51about their philosophy. The proximity was intentional.
- 3:54It showed that the Academy and the church were married.
- 3:57They weren't dating, they were married.
- 3:58That feels different from today. Often it feels like the academic
- 4:02world of theology is over here in the university dealing with
- 4:05high minded theories and the local churches over there
- 4:08dealing with potlucks and parking lots.
- 4:10And that disconnect is fatal. For Calvin, the Academy existed
- 4:15solely to work for the church. It wasn't an ivory tower where
- 4:19you went to think abstract thoughts.
- 4:20It was the engine room for the congregation.
- 4:23Who were the students? Were they these local Swiss
- 4:26kids? Some were, but the source points
- 4:28out that many were those refugees.
- 4:30We talked about aspiring leaders who had come to Geneva from all
- 4:34over Europe. They came to get equipped with
- 4:37the specific goal of going back. Going back to the places that
- 4:40were hunting them. Yes, and that is why the
- 4:43curriculum had to be so rigorous.
- 4:45The source lists what they studied.
- 4:47Hermeneutics. Hebrew.
- 4:48Greek. Dogmatic theology.
- 4:50Homiletics. OK, play devil's advocate for a
- 4:52second. If the goal is to go back to
- 4:54France and preach the simple gospel to farmers and merchants,
- 4:58why do they need Hebrew? Why do they need high level
- 5:00dogmatics? Isn't that overkill?
- 5:02That is the question we always ask in our pragmatic age.
- 5:05Just give me the basics. But think about what these men
- 5:07were facing. They were going back to a
- 5:09context where they would likely be arrested.
- 5:12They needed to be able to defend the truth against the sharpest
- 5:15minds of the establishment church.
- 5:17And more than that, they needed a conviction that was rock
- 5:21solid. You don't die for a hunch.
- 5:23Spot on. You don't face the fire for a
- 5:26vibe or a general sense of spirituality.
- 5:29You face it because you know down to the original Greek and
- 5:32Hebrew that this is the word of God.
- 5:34The academic rigor wasn't about showing off.
- 5:36It was about survival. It was about creating a backbone
- 5:39of steel. So Calvin is running this
- 5:41intense training center in the 1500s.
- 5:44Let's jump in The Time Machine and move forward about 3
- 5:47centuries. We are going to Victorian
- 5:49London. To the Prince of Preachers,
- 5:51Charles Spurgeon. Now everyone knows Spurgeon.
- 5:54If you have been a Christian for more than 5 minutes, you have
- 5:56probably seen a quote of his on social media.
- 5:59He is incredibly quotable. We think of him as the guy who
- 6:02preached to thousands at the Metropolitan Tabernacle.
- 6:05We don't usually think of him as a professor.
- 6:07But the source argues that his role as a trainer was just as
- 6:11significant as his role as a preacher, and the story of how
- 6:15his college started is great because it is so accidental.
- 6:19It wasn't a grand strategy. Not at first.
- 6:22It started in 1855 with one guy, a young man named Thomas
- 6:25Medhurst. Just one student.
- 6:28Just one Spurgeon met with him weekly.
- 6:31Here's the most famous preacher in the world, with all the
- 6:33demands on his time, carving out hours every week to sit with one
- 6:37young man and teach him theology.
- 6:39That is the definition of organic.
- 6:41It wasn't a board meeting decision.
- 6:42It was a personal investment. And because it was effective, it
- 6:46grew. One student became 22, became a
- 6:48dozen. By 1864, less than 10 years
- 6:51later, he had over 100 men. That is rapid growth.
- 6:55The need for a formal structure became obvious.
- 6:57He couldn't just do it in his study anymore, so he founded the
- 7:00pastors college. I appreciate the name.
- 7:02It's not the Spurgeon Institute for Advanced Intellectual
- 7:04Discourse. It's just the pastors College.
- 7:06It does what it says on the tin. It reflects his pragmatism.
- 7:09He wasn't trying to create scholars who would write dusty
- 7:12books that no one reads. He was trying to create pastors
- 7:16who would shepherd real people. The numbers in the source are
- 7:19staggering. It says by the time Spurgeon
- 7:21died in 1892, nearly 900 men had been trained there. 900 Imagine
- 7:26the footprint of that. And the source makes a really
- 7:28cool point about geography here too.
- 7:29Spurgeon himself was pretty local.
- 7:31He was in London, he didn't travel the world.
- 7:33He stayed in his pulpit, but the graduates, they went everywhere.
- 7:37The source list China, South Africa, Australia, South
- 7:41America. It is the difference between
- 7:43addition and multiplication. That is it.
- 7:45You preach a great sermon. You add listeners.
- 7:48If you train a pastor, you multiply congregations.
- 7:51Spurgeon understood that his legacy wasn't just his own
- 7:53voice. It was the voices of the men he
- 7:56trained. So we have the Geneva Model,
- 7:59Rigorous academic. Near the church.
- 8:01We have the Spurgeon model, Organic, Pastoral Missional.
- 8:04But now we have to face the music.
- 8:06The Sola Scriptura music. Right, because Calvin is great
- 8:10and Spurgeon is great, but they aren't the apostles.
- 8:13If we claim to be people of the juk, we need to find this in the
- 8:15book. Is there actually a biblical
- 8:17precedent for a seminary? This brings us to the core of
- 8:21Nathan Bussenitz's argument. He takes us to the book of Acts
- 8:26chapter 19. This is Paul's third missionary
- 8:29trip. It is.
- 8:30We are looking at roughly AD 52 to 56.
- 8:34Paul arrives in Ephesus. Set the stage for us.
- 8:36What is Ephesus like? It is not a sleepy village.
- 8:40Ephesus was a metropolis. Think of it as a combination of
- 8:43New York City and Las Vegas, with a massive religious shrine
- 8:46in the middle. It was a hub of commerce, but it
- 8:49was also the home of the Temple of Artemis.
- 8:50One of the wonders of the ancient world.
- 8:52Huge Pagan temple cult, prostitution, occult practices,
- 8:57magic. It was a spiritually dark, heavy
- 8:59place and Paul walks right into the middle.
- 9:01Of it he starts in the synagogue as usual.
- 9:03It was a standard operating procedure.
- 9:05Go to the Jews first. He preaches there for three
- 9:07months. The text says he was speaking
- 9:08out boldly and reasoning and persuading them about the
- 9:11Kingdom of God. But then the walls go up.
- 9:13Resistance sets in. Acts 19.9 says that some of them
- 9:17became hardened, they stopped believing and not only that,
- 9:21they started speaking evil of the way in front of the
- 9:24multitude. The way being the early term for
- 9:26Christianity. Right.
- 9:27So the synagogue transitions from a place of opportunity to a
- 9:31hostile environment. They are publicly trashing the
- 9:34gospel. So this is the pivot point.
- 9:36Paul has a choice. He can pack up and leave town.
- 9:39He can try to fight them or he can do something else.
- 9:42He chooses option C, he withdraws, he detates the
- 9:46disciples, the people who actually believed, and he moves
- 9:49his operation. He goes to the school of
- 9:50Tyrannis. We have to stop on that name the
- 9:53school of Tyrannis. It sounds like a villain in a
- 9:55comic book. It really does tyrannis.
- 9:58The Greek word literally means tyrant.
- 10:00So was that his actual name given at birth?
- 10:02Hello little baby tyrant. Probably not.
- 10:05Scholars think it was likely a nickname given to him by his
- 10:07students. That makes sense.
- 10:08Here comes Mr. Tyrant. So he was probably a tough
- 10:11teacher, maybe a rhetoric professor who drilled his
- 10:14students hard. Or just a generally unpleasant
- 10:17landlord. We don't know for sure, but the
- 10:19source notes the irony. You have the Hall of the Tyrant,
- 10:23a place probably associated with harshness, now hosting the
- 10:27Apostle of Grace. So Paul rents this hall and
- 10:30this, according to our source, is the first seminary.
- 10:33It is the prototype. You have a distinct space.
- 10:36You have a distinct teacher. You have a distinct group of
- 10:39students and you have a curriculum.
- 10:41Let's breakdown what actually happened there.
- 10:43The source identifies 3 features, the imperative, the
- 10:47investment, and the impact. Let's look at the imperative
- 10:50first. This is about the content.
- 10:51We talked about how Paul left the synagogue.
- 10:54The analysis in the source makes a really sharp point here.
- 10:56Paul didn't leave because he was thin skinned.
- 10:59He left because the message was polarizing.
- 11:01He. Didn't soften it.
- 11:02No, when the synagogue got angry, Paul didn't say.
- 11:04OK guys, let's find some common ground.
- 11:06Let's tone down the Jesus stuff and just talk about monotheism.
- 11:10That would be the modern temptation.
- 11:11Let's be relevant. Let's not offend.
- 11:13Paul knew that the gospel is inherently offensive to the
- 11:16pride of man. It says you are a Sinner and you
- 11:19cannot save yourself. That makes people mad.
- 11:23The source quotes Donald Barnhouse, who says that the
- 11:26reaction Paul got is the same reaction any faithful witness
- 11:30will get. Some will believe, but the
- 11:31majority will harden. So the mandate for this school
- 11:34and any seminary is to champion the truth, even when the culture
- 11:38hates it. Especially when the culture
- 11:40hates it. The School of Tyrannis was a
- 11:42countercultural institution. OK, that is the message.
- 11:45Now we get to the method, the investment.
- 11:48And this is the part where the math gets crazy.
- 11:50This is my favorite detail in the research.
- 11:51The source brings up the western text of Acts.
- 11:54Explain what that is for a second it.
- 11:55Is a manuscript tradition, essentially an ancient version
- 11:58of the book of Acts. It includes a specific detail
- 12:02that isn't in some of our standard Bibles, but scholars
- 12:05believe it reflects accurate historical information.
- 12:09It adds a time stamp to Paul's teaching.
- 12:11It says he taught from the 5th hour to the 10th hour.
- 12:13In Roman time keeping, the day starts at sunrise around 60 AM.
- 12:18So the 5th hour is 110AM, the 10th hour is 4.00 AM. 11 to 4,
- 12:25middle of the day. Why is that significant?
- 12:28Because in Ephesus, and really in that whole region, 1100 AM is
- 12:32when everything stopped the. Siesta.
- 12:34The heat is intense. The sun is beating down.
- 12:36Shops closed, shutters are pulled.
- 12:39People went home to eat and sleep.
- 12:40The city went quiet. So the lecture hall of Tyrannis
- 12:43was probably empty. And cheap Charnes probably
- 12:45wasn't renting it out for top dollar during the nap time.
- 12:48So Paul, who we know is on a budget, rents the graveyard
- 12:51shift of the day. But wait.
- 12:52Connect this to Paul's day job. We know he was a tent maker.
- 12:55He worked with his hands. This is where it gets grueling.
- 12:58Paul likely woke up at sunrise, worked his manual labor job
- 13:02cutting leather, stitching heavy fabric until 110AM.
- 13:06He is working hard. He is sweating.
- 13:08Then the whistle blows. Everyone else goes home to nap.
- 13:10And Paul wipes the sweat off his face, grabs his quick bite, runs
- 13:13to the lecture hall and teaches theology for five hours late.
- 13:16Well, everyone else is sleeping. And then at 4:00 PM, when the
- 13:19city wakes up again, he likely went back to work or did
- 13:22evangelism in the market. That is incredible, I feel lazy
- 13:25just hearing about it. It is convicting.
- 13:28But think about the students, too.
- 13:29Who were they? They weren't wealthy aristocrats
- 13:32with leisure time. They were likely workers too.
- 13:35They were giving up their rest to learn doctrine.
- 13:37They were trading sleep for truth.
- 13:39That shows a level of hunger that we rarely see.
- 13:42They were willing to be physically exhausted, to get
- 13:45mentally sharpened. The source does the math on the
- 13:47Siesta school. Let's walk through it 5 hours a
- 13:50day. Yeah, six days a week for two
- 13:53years. OK 5 * 6 is 30 hours a week
- 13:56times roughly 50 weeks in a year.
- 13:58It comes out to approximately 3000 hours of instruction. 3000
- 14:02hours I cannot even wrap my head around.
- 14:04That Let's compare it to a modern context.
- 14:06A standard seminary course, like a semester long class on the
- 14:09Gospels, is usually about three credit hours.
- 14:12That translates to roughly 40 hours of actual classroom time.
- 14:15So 3000 / 40. It is the equivalent of about 75
- 14:19modern seminary courses. 75 courses that is multiple
- 14:23degrees. It is several Master of Divinity
- 14:26degrees stacked on top of each other in two years.
- 14:29That completely destroys the idea that the early church was
- 14:31just floating around on vibes and spirit LED chaos.
- 14:34It was incredibly structured. It was systematic.
- 14:37Paul wasn't just giving them a thought for the day, Acts 20
- 14:40says. He declared to them the whole
- 14:42purpose of God. The whole Council.
- 14:44That implies a system. He taught them soteriology, how
- 14:47we are saved, Christology, who Jesus is, pneumatology, the work
- 14:52of the Spirit, ecclesiology, how the Church runs.
- 14:56He gave them the entire framework of the faith.
- 14:58And he did it during his lunch break.
- 15:00It redefines what we mean by discipleship.
- 15:02We think discipleship is meeting for coffee once a month for an
- 15:05hour. Paul thought discipleship was
- 15:083000 hours of immersive instruction.
- 15:10So you have the imperative, the bold message, you have the
- 15:13investment, the massive time commitment.
- 15:16Now, what was the result? The impact?
- 15:18X 19.10 gives us the report card.
- 15:21It says all who lived in Asia heard the word of the Lord, both
- 15:24Jews and Greeks. All who lives in Asia now, Asia
- 15:27here doesn't mean the continent like China and Japan.
- 15:29No, it refers to the Roman province of Asia, which is
- 15:32basically the western chunk of modern day Turkey.
- 15:35But still, that is a huge area, hundreds of thousands of.
- 15:39People. Did Paul go to all those towns
- 15:40personally? He couldn't have.
- 15:42He was in the lecture hall every day from 11:00 to 4:00.
- 15:45He was tied to the school. So how did they hear?
- 15:48The students This is a radiating center concept.
- 15:51Paul poured into these men in the Hall of Tyrannis.
- 15:54Then they left the hall and went back to their hometowns.
- 15:57We went to the Lycus Valley. The source mentions cities like
- 16:00Colisea, Hieropolis, Leticia. Right, we have the book of
- 16:04Colossians in our Bible, but Paul had never been to
- 16:07Colossians when he wrote it. He says in chapter 2 that they
- 16:09had not seen his face. So who started the church there?
- 16:12A man named Epiphras. And where did Epiphras learn the
- 16:15gospel? Almost certainly in the school
- 16:17of Tyrannis. So Epiphras sits in the hot
- 16:19lecture hall, learns from Paul, goes home and plants a church.
- 16:23And likely the seven churches of Revelation, Ephesus, Smyrna,
- 16:26Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laotia were all
- 16:31founded or strengthened during this two year window.
- 16:33It was a missions machine. It was the seminary wasn't the
- 16:36end of the road. It was the launchpad.
- 16:38You come in, you get loaded up with truth, and you shoot out to
- 16:41plant churches. It really validates the model.
- 16:43Concentrated training leads to exponential expansion.
- 16:47And that leads us to the next link in the chain.
- 16:50Because Paul didn't stay in Ephesus forever.
- 16:53Eventually he leaves and years later we find him in a very
- 16:57different setting. He is in Rome, he is in a
- 16:59dungeon. He is waiting to be beheaded by
- 17:02Nero. The mood has changed.
- 17:04It is the end of his life. He picks up his pen to write his
- 17:08final letter. Second Timothy.
- 17:10And he writes it to his spiritual son, Timothy.
- 17:12And where is Timothy at this point?
- 17:14He is pastoring in Ephesus, the very same city.
- 17:17So the geography circles back. Paul writes the famous verse
- 17:20Second Timothy 2.2. The things which you have heard
- 17:23from me in the presence of many witnesses, entrust these to
- 17:26faithful men who will be able to teach others also.
- 17:29The source suggests there is a memory trigger in that verse.
- 17:31Think about it, when Paul says the things you heard from me in
- 17:34the presence of many witnesses, what is Timothy picturing?
- 17:37He is picturing the school of Tyrannus.
- 17:39Acts 19.22 tells us Timothy was there.
- 17:42He was one of the guys in the room.
- 17:44He saw Paul sweating. He saw Paul answering questions.
- 17:46He saw the grind. So when Paul says do what I did,
- 17:49he isn't speaking abstractly. He is saying, Timothy, remember
- 17:53the lecture hall, remember the 3000 hours?
- 17:55Do that. Find faithful men.
- 17:58Pour the truth into them so they can pour it into others.
- 18:01It is the chain of custody. Paul the Timothy Timothy to
- 18:04faithful men, Faithful men to others. 4 generations in one
- 18:08verse. And the mechanism for that
- 18:10transfer, the actual tool used to move the deposit of faith
- 18:12from one brain to another, was the rigorous daily teaching
- 18:15model. The Tyrannis model.
- 18:17So to answer the question we started with, it's a seminary.
- 18:20Biblical, the source argues absolutely yes.
- 18:23Whether you call it a seminary, an Academy, or a discipleship
- 18:26center, the principle is the same.
- 18:28You need a dedicated time and space to transfer the
- 18:30heavyweight of God's truth to the next generation.
- 18:33That is a compelling case from history and Scripture.
- 18:37But I can hear the skeptic in the back of the room saying, OK,
- 18:40that worked for Paul in the 1st century, that worked for Calvin
- 18:43in the 16th century, but we live in the 21st century.
- 18:46The world is different. We have the Internet, we have
- 18:49global travel, we have completely different cultural
- 18:51dynamics. Does this Tyrannis model, this
- 18:54heavy investment actually work today, or is it an antique?
- 18:59To answer that, we turn to our second source for this deep
- 19:02dive, the interview from Lebanon.
- 19:04This brings us to Mark Jeffries and Maurice Boutros.
- 19:08Let's introduce them. Mark is an American missionary.
- 19:11Maurice is a Lebanese national who came to faith and is now a
- 19:14partner in the ministry. And right out of the gate,
- 19:16Maurice gives us a reality check.
- 19:18He critiques what he calls the tourist missionary.
- 19:21That is a stinging phrase. Tourist.
- 19:23Missionary. It is sharp, but it comes from
- 19:25his experience. He describes missionaries who
- 19:28come to Lebanon for short stints, one year, two years.
- 19:31About two weeks. Right.
- 19:32They come, they distribute money, they run a program, they
- 19:35take some photos, and they leave.
- 19:37He says they treat it like a third world project.
- 19:39He says they don't share our problems, they're visitors, they
- 19:43have returned ticket in their pocket and because of that they
- 19:47never really understand the context.
- 19:49That is the opposite of the Tyrannis model.
- 19:51Paul moved in for two years. He worked the local jobs.
- 19:54He lived on the local schedule. Mark Jeffries, the missionary in
- 19:57the interview, adopts that Pauline mindset.
- 20:02But he admits it wasn't easy. When he arrived in Lebanon, he
- 20:05had a major problem. He couldn't speak Arabic.
- 20:07Right, so he couldn't just rent a hall and start lecturing on
- 20:09Romans. He was effectively mute.
- 20:11So what did he do? He.
- 20:13Had to rely on life on on life. Discipleship.
- 20:15He couldn't teach with words, so he taught with his actions.
- 20:18Maurice says something striking here.
- 20:20He says I saw what he would do in hard times.
- 20:22This is the crisis's classroom concept.
- 20:25Lebanon has been through a lot in the last few years.
- 20:27To revolution. The financial collapse Imagine
- 20:30your life savings evaporating overnight because the currency
- 20:33lost 90% of its value. The.
- 20:35Port explosion in Beirut. Massive devastation, windows
- 20:39blown out for miles. Mark was there for all of that,
- 20:42and Maurice was watching him. He was watching how the theology
- 20:45actually worked when the glass was shattering.
- 20:47Yes, you can lecture on the sovereignty of God in a clean
- 20:51air conditioned classroom. It is a nice concept.
- 20:54But when your bank account is frozen and your house is damaged
- 20:58and the missionary is standing there beside you, not panicking
- 21:00but praying, that is the lesson. Maurice says it is not about a
- 21:04book, it is about availability and confronting sin.
- 21:08That confrontation piece is interesting.
- 21:10He says Mark earned the right to confront him because of the
- 21:12relationship. They drank a lot of coffee.
- 21:14Gallons of coffee. In the Middle East, coffee is
- 21:18the vehicle for discipleship. You sit, you talk, you build
- 21:21trust, and then you open the Bible.
- 21:23Let's talk about the language barrier again, because the
- 21:26source calls this a strategic cultural adaptation.
- 21:30Mark spent six years learning Arabic.
- 21:32Six years, just pause on that. That is a massive amount of
- 21:35time. Think about the humility
- 21:37required. You are a grown man.
- 21:39You have a theology degree of things to say, but for six years
- 21:43you speak like a toddler. You stumble over words.
- 21:46You make mistakes. Why do it?
- 21:48Why not just use a translator? Maurice explains the payoff.
- 21:52Because Mark learned the language, he wasn't just able to
- 21:54disciple Maurice, he was able to talk to Maurice's father.
- 21:57And Mark's wife could talk to Maurice's mother.
- 22:00The older generation didn't speak English.
- 22:02If Mark had relied on English, he would have hit a generational
- 22:05wall. By paying the cost of the
- 22:07language, He unlocked the family.
- 22:09He unlocked the culture. Mark quotes First Corinthians
- 22:129.22. I have become all things to all
- 22:15men. He interprets that in a very
- 22:17challenging way. He says to become all things,
- 22:19you have to stop being some things.
- 22:21You have to give up parts of your own cultural identity.
- 22:24You cannot be fully American if you want to be effective in
- 22:27Lebanon. You have to createspace in your
- 22:29heart for the new culture, and that means evicting some of your
- 22:32old comforts. Which brings us to the section
- 22:35on the cost, because Maurice drops a metaphor that I think
- 22:38every Western listener needs to hear.
- 22:40The Disneyland comment. Tell us about that.
- 22:42Maurice He visited the United States.
- 22:45He saw the churches, the homes, the lifestyle and he thanked the
- 22:49team for leaving Disneyland. He calls America Disneyland.
- 22:52Is he wrong? Think about it from his
- 22:54perspective. You flip a switch, the lights
- 22:57come on always. You turn a handle, clean water
- 23:00comes out. You want gas, it is at the pump.
- 23:02You want food? It is delivered tomorrow.
- 23:05It is a fantasy world compared to the instability of the Middle
- 23:08East. So when a missionary leaves that
- 23:11voluntarily leaves the Magic Kingdom to come live in a place
- 23:14where the power cuts out and the government is unstable, that
- 23:19sacrifice speaks louder than any sermon.
- 23:21It validates the message. It says this gospel is worth
- 23:24more than comfort. But Mark warns about a new
- 23:26danger, the technology trap. This is so relevant.
- 23:30He says technology keeps us tethered to Disneyland.
- 23:32In the old days, like Adoniram Judson going to Burma in the
- 23:351800s, when you left, you left. You packed your stuff in a
- 23:38coffin. You said goodbye forever.
- 23:40You cut the cord, there was no going back.
- 23:42But today you land in Beirut and you can video call your mom in
- 23:47Ohio before you even leave the airport.
- 23:49You can watch the shows you like.
- 23:50You can follow your favorite football team.
- 23:52And Mark says that is a trap because if you are emotionally
- 23:55living in Ohio every night for two hours, you are never fully
- 23:59present in Beirut. You are a ghost.
- 24:02You are haunting the mission field, but your heart is back
- 24:05home. That is a haunting image.
- 24:07He says you have to accept the loss, you have to grieve your
- 24:10culture, you have to cut the cord.
- 24:12He says your closest relationships must become the
- 24:15people in the local church. That is a hard word.
- 24:18It means your best friend cannot be the guy back home you text
- 24:21all day. It has to be the guy like
- 24:23Maurice. And that involves risk, huge
- 24:25risk. Mark talks about betrayal.
- 24:27If you open your life to someone in a foreign context, if you
- 24:30rely on them, trust them, you are vulnerable.
- 24:34They could hurt you, they could cheat you, they could turn on
- 24:36the ministry. But if you don't take that risk,
- 24:39wait. If you don't step out there, you
- 24:40don't get. The connection you never get the
- 24:42reward you never get the life on life dynamic.
- 24:45Marie says that Mark didn't just lecture him, he became a
- 24:48brother, and that brotherhood was the base for the truth.
- 24:53So we have come full circle. We started with Paul in the
- 24:56lecture hall in Ephesus. We went to Calvin in the refugee
- 25:00camp of Geneva. We ended up with Mark in a
- 25:02coffee shop in Lebanon. And the pattern is identical.
- 25:05What are the common threads? First, rigor.
- 25:08It is never light. It is 3000 hours.
- 25:11It was Hebrew and Greek. It is 6 years of Arabic.
- 25:15It is hard work. Second investment.
- 25:17It is personal. It is Paul sweating with his
- 25:19students. It is Calvin building the school
- 25:21next to the church. It is Mark drinking coffee and
- 25:24dealing with explosions with Maurice and third
- 25:28multiplication. It never stops with the student.
- 25:30It radiates out. Ephesus reaches Asia, Geneva
- 25:34reaches Europe. Mark reaches Maurice, who
- 25:37reaches his people. It is the same gospel, the same
- 25:40method, just different centuries.
- 25:42So as we wrap up this deep dive, I want to turn the spotlight on
- 25:45you, the listener. Because chances are you aren't
- 25:47about to move to Beirut, and you probably aren't going to quit
- 25:50your job to start a lecture hall during nap time.
- 25:52But the principle of the tyrannis model still applies to
- 25:54you. We live in an age of down
- 25:57unloaded knowledge. We think if we listen to an
- 26:00audio show, even a good one like this, we are trained.
- 26:04We treat knowledge as a commodity.
- 26:06We consume it. But the biblical model is that
- 26:10training is an investment. It costs something.
- 26:12It costs the Siesta. That is the challenge.
- 26:15Paul gave up his leisure. Mark gave up his Disneyland
- 26:18comforts. If you want to know God, I mean
- 26:22really know Him, not just have a few facts, but have that
- 26:25structural theology that can withstand a crisis, what are you
- 26:29willing to give? Up what needs to be cut off.
- 26:31Is it the two hours of streaming TV at night?
- 26:34Is it the scrolling on social media?
- 26:35Is it the hobby that consumes all your mental energy?
- 26:38You cannot have the impact of an Axe 19 without the investment of
- 26:41an axe 19 you. Have to do the time, you have to
- 26:43sit in the lecture hall, you have to find the faithful men.
- 26:46We are the beneficiaries of a long chain of people who did
- 26:48that, from Paul to Timothy all the way down to us.
- 26:51The question is, are we going to keep the chain going?
- 26:54That is the question. Something for you to chew on
- 26:57this week. Think about what that cutting
- 27:00off looks like in your own life. Thanks for taking this deep dive
- 27:03with us. This has been reformed thinking.
- 27:05Until next time.