Transcript
[Begins mid-sentence] ...Theological Education at Princeton Seminary. We have a new mission statement at the seminary. Mission statements are very important these days to accrediting associations. The Association of Theological Schools in the United States and Canada, for example, has been so enlarged over the last 20 years, maybe 40 years, that it's difficult now to find standards that are applicable to all member schools. After Vatican II, for example, well, the ATS was founded by the so-called mainline theological schools
and the premier university divinity schools. Then came Vatican II and there was an inflow of Roman Catholic theological schools into the ATS. And in the last 20 to 25 years, there's been an enormous influx of so-called evangelical theological schools in the United States and Canada into the association. So the association has decided that since there are no criteria that are applicable to everybody, that everybody will be evaluated in terms of their own mission statement. That
is to say, each school will declare what it is it intends to do. And then when accreditation time comes, you are evaluated in the light of your own vision. I want to read the mission statement that was developed by a special committee composed of trustees and faculty and administrators and students and alums. It reads, Princeton Theological Seminary prepares women and men to serve Jesus Christ in ministries marked by faith, integrity, scholarship, competence, compassion, and joy, equipping
them for leadership worldwide in congregations and the larger church, in classrooms and the academy, and in the public arena. A professional and graduate school of the Presbyterian Church USA, the seminary stands within the reformed tradition, affirming the sovereignty of the triune God over all creation, the gospel of Jesus Christ as God's saving word for all people, the renewing power of the word and spirit in all of life, and the unity of Christ's servant church throughout the
world. This tradition shapes the instruction, research, practical training, and continuing education provided by the seminary as well as the theological scholarship it promotes. In response to Christ's call for the unity of the church, the seminary embraces in its life and work a rich racial and ethnic diversity and the breadth of communions represented in the worldwide church. In response to the transforming work of the Holy Spirit, the seminary offers its theological scholarship in service to God's renewal
of the church's life and mission. In response to God's sovereign claim over all creation, the seminary seeks to engage Christian faith with intellectual, political, and economic life in pursuit of truth, justice, compassion, and peace. To these ends, the seminary provides a residential community of worship and learning where a sense of calling is tested and defined, where scripture and the Christian tradition are appropriated critically, where faith and intellect mature and the life and lifelong friendships begin, and
where habits of discipleship are so nourished that members of the community may learn to proclaim with conviction, courage, wisdom, and love the good news that Jesus Christ is Lord. Now what kind of an educational experience seeks to implement that vision? Princeton Seminary continues to offer what I would describe as a classical theological education. We read everything, but we are committed to interpreting the tradition in order that it may be, scripture and tradition may be critically appropriated.
Tradition has been a bad word since the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment taught us to believe nothing on the basis of tradition. The Enlightenment taught us to believe nothing on the basis of traditional authority. Everyone was to think for him or herself, but tradition is making a big comeback in intellectual circles these days. Hans-Georg Gadamer, for example, has demonstrated in his magnum opus, Truth and Method, that it is impossible to think apart from tradition, that every thinking
that occurs is using language that is inherited from a language tradition, that every discipline occurs and is advanced out of a particular tradition. It's not just theology that is tradition dependent, it is science itself that has its own tradition, its own history of paradigm shifts and new advances that move out of what was known into what now is known. It was Jaroslav Pelikan who said that tradition is the living faith of people now dead. Traditionalism is
the dead faith of people now living. Tradition is not a place into which we retreat, but it is a house or a home out of which we live into the future. So our curriculum is classical in the sense that it deals primarily with the tradition, with the Bible, it deals with church history, it deals with theology and with practical theology, the classical departmental structures of Protestant theological education. But what binds the curriculum together, what binds the
departments together, what binds the disciplines represented in the faculty together, that is the question and it has been a troubling question for many. We have a son-in-law who is a physician and when Ken went to medical school, he studied medicine. We have a son who is an attorney and when he attended law school, he studied the law. We have another daughter who is a Presbyterian minister and when she attended Princeton Seminary, she studied theology,
theology. Ministers need to know theology, just as lawyers need to know the law, just as physicians need to know medicine. Now there are disciplines that contribute to a medical education, but it is still medicine that is studied. There are many disciplines and aspects of the law that are studied in law school, but it is still the law. There are many disciplines represented in a theological faculty, but the subject matter that binds them together is in fact
theology. From theos, God, logos, word. Not just words about God, but about God's word. God's word, God's self-revelation, as Karl Barth would put it, attested in holy scripture. We study the scriptures, not for their historical information, although that's important, not for their literary characteristics, although that's important because scripture does come to us in the genre of literature, not as a source for understanding the sociology of the ancient Hebrews or the early first century Christians, although
that's important. But we study scripture in order to hear the word of God. Scripture attests to many things, but the central attestation of scripture, its central witness, its central concern, its primary reference is the living God, the God who called Abraham and Sarah out of Ur of the Chaldees, the God who led Moses and the children of Israel through the Red Sea, the God who entered into covenant with this people, the God who judged them, the
God who raised up kings, judged kings, the God who led them into exile, the God who led them out of exile, back to the promised land, the God who in the fullness of time sent forth his only son to be born of a woman and born under the law, the Christ who lived for us and died for us, the church that was created by the Spirit of God on the basis of its witness to the risen
Christ. Scripture attests to God, and it is the theological dimension of scripture, it is the witness of scripture to God and to Christ and to the Holy Spirit, or as we would say from our perspective to the triune God, it is that aspect of scripture that is of central importance. I need to tell you how difficult it is these days to find young scholars who are interested in the theological interpretation of scripture. I sat through eight
interviews at the ATS-SBL meeting, that's the American Academy of Religion and the AAR, the AAR-SBL, American Academy of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature meeting in Washington, DC several years ago as we looked for a junior appointment in New Testament, and I don't usually do that, but I was there and I wanted to see what the committee was, what was available to the committee, and at one point or another either Dr. Sakenfeld or
Dr. Mouser would ask the candidate, can you tell us who the theologian is who has been most influential in your understanding of the Christian faith, and you could just see the glaze come over the eyes. One person said, well Gadamer, wonderful philosopher but not a theologian. One person said, well I think in seminary I read Kuhn and Schillebeeckx's, good modern Roman Catholic theologians, but their interest was in the literary characteristic of scripture, its attestation to the
historical and sociological circumstances of the first century, but not to the witness of scripture to God. None of them were appointed, I need to I need to add hastily. We're interested in the logos of theos as it is attested in the sacred scriptures of the church, but what about church history? Well if you read Acts very carefully, you will note that in the very opening sentences Luke says in the first book, O Theophilus, I told you
all that Jesus began to do and to teach. And the inference is that now I'm going to tell you in this volume all that Jesus is continuing to do and to teach through the spirit as given to the church and worked out through the apostles. The real question is whether Luke acts is the two-volume work or a one-volume work in two volumes. I think the latter is the case. I think Luke saw that the
word of God now was growing. In fact he uses that phrase at key points in the development of his story and the word of God increased and the church, God added to the church and God multiplied the disciples. The growth of the church was the increase of the word of God. That is to say the story of the church is, in its own way, the story of God's word at work in the life of the church.
It is the gospel that creates the church, it is the gospel that sustains the church, it is the gospel that guides the church, it is the gospel by the spirit that empowers the church, it is the gospel that judges the church. And the history of the church can be viewed not just as a history of institutions or history of doctrine, but the history of the growth of the Word of God, so that your life and mine
is caught up in this story, this unfolding story, as your life and mine has been touched by the gospel and by the Living Christ, and we become a part of the story, and our articulation of that story, our witness to that story, is a part of the growth of the Word of God through history. The story of the end story. That's why the Acts of the Apostles doesn't end. It just stops. Have you ever noticed that?
You're surprised. What? All right, Paul's in Rome. Now, now what? Nothing. You're just left hanging because Luke knew the story was still being written and would be told across the ages. Now, we teach theology at not anthropology with a large A. We talk seriously about God, the God attested in scripture, the God confessed by the church across the ages, the God attested in the great creeds of the church. In fact, there is at Princeton Seminary still
the belief that down deep there is a coherence to the witness of scripture in the midst of all of its diversity as it has come to us over time and in multifarious ways that there's still nonetheless down deep a cohesive, coherent witness to the living God as attested in scripture and confessed by the church, and we try to get at that in our theological studies here. Studying the great minds of the church, studying Schleiermacher, studying Barth,
studying Calvin, studying Luther to critically appropriate the great tradition of the church, that which has been given to us today. And the practical department, well you know that the practical department here may be the most theoretical department in the seminary, and in many ways the most exciting theologically. This is not the courses on where do you put the paste and where do you get the paper and how do you arrange the room. It's courses about how
do you teach, what do we know about human beings and the way they learn in order that we may teach and preach the gospel to them at different stages of their life development. The psychology of human development becomes very, very important. How do you engage as a pastor in counseling with people? Are there things that modern psychology has learned that may be of help to us without our becoming or trying to become ourselves therapists? How do
you preach the Word of God? How do you speak when you try to preach the Word of God? And so on and so forth. But it is theology, the logos of theos, that people study at Princeton Seminary. Now the tradition is something that no one ever appropriates fully. It's an invitation to enter into the house and into the community that lives in the house. Theological education is like the ancient university really. It is a community of
discourse. It is a community that takes the reading of text very seriously. It is a community that thrives in argument. I confess that there are days when as an administrator I would prefer less argument here. But for there to be no argument here would be the death of the institution, the death of the community. It is as we engage each other, not only in classrooms as students engage faculty and faculty students, but as students engage each
other around the luncheon tables and the dinner tables and in the dorm room, it is of engagement that is pedagogical and a part of the Princeton experience. So that in the end no two people come out of here looking exactly alike or probably believing exactly alike. But hopefully having appropriated the scripture and the tradition critically, their faith and their intellect has been matured and lifelong friendships have begun. And the habits of discipleship have been nourished that
members of the community may learn to proclaim with conviction, courage, wisdom, and love the good news of Jesus Christ. Yesterday at luncheon I mentioned a letter that a member of the class of '73 had written to me and afterward Fred Anderson, a member of that class and a member of our board of trustees who heard this letter read on Tuesday, asked me to read it to you. He thought it was so extraordinary and I'm going to
close by reading this letter from Robert Bailey. He says, today when I went to the post office to pick up some mail for the church, the current issue of Inspire was waiting for me. I went out to my car, sat and read the issue through from cover to cover. That exposure prompted me to sit down and communicate something I have thought about for some time. This year I will return to the campus for the 25th reunion
of my class, the class of '73. Just thinking about being back after so many years away conjures up a constellation of memories and feelings. I think about people I knew then but haven't seen for years and of a fellow classmate who just called me this week after a 25 year hiatus and I am thankful for such ties of friendship. I think about my wrestling matches with languages and the gentle patience of Cullen I. K. story, the struggling
with theological nuances and the attempt to embrace 2,000 years of church history in my brief lifespan of thinking and And I am grateful. The chapel was a special place for me. The sound of many voices raised in the singing of the great hymns of the church with the majestic support of the pipe organ provided a theological and spiritual timeout sort of place where all the books and papers and discussions and questions were somehow placed before
the simple cross of faith and allowed to be I remember someone, a professor, I don't remember who, telling us one day in a chapel service, ladies and gentlemen you know more now than you will the rest of your lives. I think we thought it was a compliment but time has shown him to be ever so right. All that I experienced at seminary was connected to what I experienced in Miller Chapel and when I recall those connections
I am grateful. What I received from Princeton however that has kept that has most marked my life and will continue to do so for the rest of it cannot be located in transcript or thesis. It is not even something I can articulate, it's awkward to explain, it's neither emotional nor cognitive but neither is it mystical or metaphysical. It's an inner sense of perceiving, of thinking, of going at things, of approaching tasks theological and otherwise. Princeton gave
me a way of doing theology, of doing ministry, of approaching viewing and interpreting life which really translates in doing my own pilgrimage, working out my own salvation with fear and trembling that cannot be reduced to words. I have been a pastor for 25 years and been preaching all that time caring for people, finding my own dark nights of the soul integrated into the larger life of the community of faith and hope. While some of the what
I acquired at Princeton is not readily accessible in my memory bank, the how continues to permeate all that I do. I am grateful. It is not always an easier route to take this one you gave me at Princeton. Blind monolithic models can have a superficial appeal and a pretense of security but that's not life and that's not faith. A quote I encountered in my reading and seminary has remained with me to this day found in the
letter of the Church of Rome to the Church of Corinth commonly called Clement's first letter and written about 96 AD it reads, you see brothers the more knowledge we are given the greater risk we run. Princeton taught me how to run this risk and integrate it with faith resulting in a deepening of that faith. I am grateful. It is ultimately a wordless gift perhaps that is as it should be for Princeton is a faith community and
faith by definition cannot be reduced to something available to sense or thought. At the hearing of this some might sense an incipient arrogance as though Princeton by name and history and reputation is a bit above other schools. I cannot speak for others for I did not attend them. I attended Princeton but I hope this will not be the case. Rather it is simply my desire and intent to identify a gift Princeton Theological Seminary handed to me
during my three years journey there a wordless gift I wish to acknowledge and for which I want to say thank you. It has taken me 25 years to write this. Maybe it is now time. May you know the wisdom guidance and peace of the Lord as you seek to be what he has called you to be at Princeton Theological Seminary. It is your place of greater risk and wordless gifts. I become emotional when I read that
because I could not have said it beautifully but that has been my experience as a student and then as a pastor for almost three decades. My joy in being here is to be a part of a place where God is at work through a faculty to allow students to enter in to this great discussion to study theology to critically appropriate history on the basis of the scriptures to critically appropriate the scriptures on the basis of the
gospel and then to go forth as men and women whose ministries will be marked by faith, integrity, scholarship, competence, compassion, and joy and joy. Let us pray. To thee, O Lord, we all lift hearts of praise and gratitude for that gift that has been given to us at different times in this place through this place by those who have labored here in years gone by and by those who continue to labor here. We are grateful for
the memories of them and for the We're grateful for the friendships that began here so long ago and that continue as we pick up conversations years later just where we drop them. We thank you for the gospel of your son Jesus the Christ. We thank you for the reality of your church for all of its warts that has nurtured us and brought us to faith and given us the privilege of serving it through the years. We
thank you for the confidence that we have in history in the future because we we look to the past not as a place to hide but as a promise. Knowing that when we appropriate the past as a promise we can look to the future and hope. We covet that, we claim it, and we give you thanks above all for Princeton Theological Seminary. In the name of Jesus we ask this amen. We stand adjourned and it's coffee
hour time. At 11 o'clock there is our next lecture and we will see you then.