We may have had this discussion around here, but I think it’s time to crack it open again.
One thing about the Southern Convention of Great Commission Baptists is that, from a denominational perspective, we have no education requirements for our ministers. We have no central standard for ordination, and even our statement of faith is optional for those serving in churches. (I know to be NAMB/IMB/Lifeway you have to agree. Not sure about Guidestone.)
This is the reality, and it’s connected to our belief in local church autonomy. After all, the seminaries and boards exist to serve the needs of the churches, not tell the churches what to do or who can serve. Any church in the Great Commission Convention of Southern Baptists can ordain anyone they see fit–but no other church is required to recognize that ordination. Which is something that we see with deacons, but not all that often with ministers.
The end-result of this situation is that we have some highly educated ministers and some lowly educated ministers. We also have a tremendous opportunity for the self-educated minister to develop and serve with excellence. With that in mind, I want to poll the audience and get some opinions.
First, though, a few observations: I do think learning is best accomplished among other people who are learning and under the guidance of those who have gone before. A major regret for me is that I did not go to seminary early in my time in ministry, sit in a traditional classroom for 4 more years after 4 years of Biblical Studies in college, and put another her diploma on the wall.
I am currently trying to put that diploma on the wall via a non-traditional system that is an internet-based, but still accredited, seminary. So I do see and respect the importance of checking that box on the road to respectability. After all,Timothy was circumcised as an adult to be able to minister in certain contexts. (Acts 16:3) I can stand a few vocal shewas and write papers. Although I have found that blogging has not helped my academic writing abilities.
Here, then, are my questions for you to answer in the comments: (note: The Bible is not the answer to any of these. I assume that none of us would help someone into ministry without starting with the Bible and holding onto it all the way through. I know that the most important text on any Christian subject is Scripture, we’re looking at second-best, here.)
Feel free to just pick one or two, and no, I’m not using you to do my homework.
1. Apart from the Bible, which should be a no-brainer, if you could hand a new minister only one book, what book would you give?
2. What is the best book on preaching you would recommend to a new preacher?
3. What is the best book on building disciples you would recommend?
4. What historical preacher (deceased prior to WWII) would you recommend the new minister to learn about and from?
5. What current preacher would you recommend?
6. What is the best personal devotional text you would recommend for keeping the minister’s own sword sharp?
7. In 50 words or less, what is the advice you would give?
8. What blogs or podcasts would you recommend, if any?
9. Would you encourage the minister to build an e-library or a physical one? Why?
10. What overall theology work would you recommend?
11. What would you recommend for learning history? Would you even bother?
12. Ministerial counseling: what books or resources?
1. I would give them Grasping God’s Word- best overview of hermeneutics in book form I have ever seen. I am indebted to Dr. Tim Pierce for introducing me to this book in seminary. It has kept me from abusing God’s Word on many occasions. 2. I have never read a good one and hope to get some suggestions from this comment stream 3. The Great Omission by Dallas Willard 4. Charles Spurgeon 5. Probably Tim Keller or David Platt. Not to start controversy but they are two of the best I have ever encountered at handling the Word and… Read more »
Wait, an iPad can’t be powered by hamster wheel?
At last, we’ve found the weakness!
1. Apart from the Bible, which should be a no-brainer, if you could hand a new minister only one book, what book would you give? Lectures to My Students by Spurgeon- It covers all the bases, right down to reminding you that you should be careful to always pay attention to children! 2. What is the best book on preaching you would recommend to a new preacher? Preachers and Preaching by Martin Lloyd-Jones- 3. What is the best book on building disciples you would recommend? Trellis and the Vine 4. What historical preacher (deceased prior to WWII) would you recommend… Read more »
I’d like to caveat everything I write here with the fact that I’m young and I’m not involved in fulltime ministry (yet). **I’ve added links. Amazon gives me a small percentage back for each item purchased through these links.** 1. The Painful Side of Leadership by Jeff Iorg. 2. I haven’t read that many, so I’ll just go with the most recent one: Preach by Mark Dever and Greg Gilbert. 3. Real-Life Discipleship by Jim Putman. 4. John Bunyan. Not to be confused with Paul. 5. Alistair Begg, but only for the accent. 6. The first few verses of 2… Read more »
Alistair Begg, but only for the accent.
+1
One of the ladies in the church mentioned hearing a great sermon on her iPhone RefNet app, but she couldn’t remember who it was. She started talking about accent, so I asked if it was Alistair Begg.
Nailed it.
“Be ignorant. Too many people think they are experts and knowledgeable about everything. If you recognize that you don’t know much, you’d be surprised at how much you can learn.”
*That*, I believe, is one of the lessons to be drawn from I Cor 8:2. It’s too easy to get hung up on what you already know, and let your pride at that hinder you from learning even more.
I think before you even get to the books, you need to learn that we’re not Great Commission Baptists (unless you know of some Convention somewhere, that I don’t know about).
🙂
Now, Bob, we’re the SCGCB or the GCSCB or something like that. Why choose when we can be both?
🙂
Great questions Doug. 1. Brothers We Are Not Professionals by John Piper 2. Christ-Centered Preaching by Bryan Chapell 3. Trellis and the Vine 4. John Newton 5. John Piper 6. If you mean the Scriptures I’d say the Psalms. If you mean more devotional type of books I would say to read through anything from John Newton. Or maybe a few Paul Tripp books as well. 7. Something similar to “I’m not interested to know if you can set the Thames on fire. What I want to know is this: If I picked you up by the scruff of the… Read more »
Mike,
I’ve got the Spanish version of Brothers, We are Not Professionals, but I haven’t read it yet. Would you recommend reading it all at once, or taking a chapter here and a chapter there?
I doubt that you can read it all at once. What I mean by that is that some of the chapters are so striking (at least in my own experience) that you will have to put down the book and reorder your life. (I’m only partially kidding).
I’ve read it both ways and found the most benefit in reading it slowly.
I doubt that you can read it all at once.
For a second I thought you were talking about my Spanish skills. I’ve got mad skills, man! 😉
the only Spanish I know is that El Nino is Spanish for The Nino.
You’re right—I had 12 questions in mind, and locked up on the twelth. That’s it: counseling or “ministerial guidance” or whatever the laws of your state require it to be called.
And I added that to the post.
I’m not answering the questions exactly, but back when I was president of the BCI, I wanted to start a program sending 5 books to all the young preachers (and we get a lot of them) who came to pastor in Iowa. 1) The Supremacy of God in Preaching, by Piper. Reminds us that our chief aim in preaching is vertical, not just horizontal. 2) The Heart of the Problem, by Brandt and Skinner. A counselling style based on applying scriptures to situations. 3) Liberating Ministry from the Success Syndrome, Kent Hughes. Defines success in a more biblical way than… Read more »
Dave, that usage may be where this heads: we’re looking at ways to develop pastoral encouragement in our association, and we’ve got several folks that have been out of seminary for a while and one or two that never went–so gathering and sharpening our tools is one of the goals we have as a group.
And I need to know what the best sharpeners are so we can plan that.
Doug,
I’m not sure if you meet with the local pastors or not but one of the things that we did in Missouri was have a Tuesday morning prayer meeting every week and after we met together we went through one of these ministry type books.
Doing it this way helped those pastors with lesser means (like myself) to only have to purchase a $10 book once every couple months and also to benefit from hearing the reflections of those with differing education and ministerial backgrounds.
We’re trying to get that started. For an old-line state, our county is pretty sparsely populated, with 13 Southern Baptist Churches in our association, which is spread across over 1000 square miles. By North Dakota standards, that’s a lot, but around here, that’s pretty lightweight. Only 6 of our pastors are full-time, so we’re trying to get a schedule going that fits what the bi-vocational guys need. One thing we want to do is provide tools but do it in a manner that doesn’t say: “Hey, man, you’re a lousy preacher. Here’s a book to get better.” We want to… Read more »
Sounds like you are doing a great job!
Here in Indiana it’s almost impossible to have the associational strength and unity that I enjoyed in Missouri. We are the southern most church in the association and almost everybody would have to drive over an hour to be able to meet in one place. Sounds like you actually have it worse than that.
I should also mention that the “central location” would probably be a cornfield somewhere. The bigger (better represented) churches in the association seem to be on the polar ends of the association too.
I have to be careful—I pastor the church in the town that’s the central location! I’m happy to host everything, but if we do about 3 events in a row here, someone from the edge fusses about me never having to go anywhere 🙂
So, I typically point out that he’s welcome to host at his place anytime…
Glad I can be of service. 🙂
Doug, This is not a specific answer to any of your questions, and I risk coming across as self-promoting, since I am presently employed with the Adrian Rogers Pastor Training Institute, and Adrian Rogers was my dad, but I think the best resource I know of to recommend to a non-seminary trained pastor, or prospective pastor, is the “What Every Pastor Ought to Know” DVD course, with 21 hours of practical teaching covering topics such as: – The pastor’s personal integrity – The secrets of sermon preparation – The keys to wise leadership and management – The balance of pastoral… Read more »
David,
I will echo your reference. It is outstanding and practical and encouraging… this recourse is exceptional!
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David Rogers,
I also agree.
Anything by Adrian Rogers is well worth listening to, or reading.
David R. Brumbelow
I’ve seen basic info, and it’s not self-promoting since the material is good.
Self-promoting would be me pushing my own book 🙂
1. In addition to the Bible, Spurgeon’s Lectures and All Around Ministry, Broadus Preparation and Delivery of sermons, DML-J Preachers & Preaching, & my thesis for the M.A., “The Baptists & Ministerial Qualifications:1750-1850,” which keeps the illumination aspect/gift as a part of the doctrine of ministerial qualifications in perspective (Morehead State Univ.,Ky.1971). 2. Stott’s Two Worlds (I forget the whole title). 3. Proverbs, 4.George Whitefield, Jonathan Edwards (need both to get the complete preacher) John Gano, Shubal Stearns, 5. Roy Hargraves (he grew up just down the road from where I was born, but long after I was gone). He… Read more »
Some authors I’d recommend: W. A. Criswell (wacriswell.com), Adrian Rogers (lwf.org), Jerry Vines (jerryvines.com), R. L. Sumner (biblicalevangelist.org), Warren Wiersbe, H. A. Ironside, Paige Patterson, David Allen, B. H. Carroll, L. R. Scarborough, David Jeremiah, J. Vernon McGee, John Phillips, Josh McDowell, Norman Geisler, R. G. Lee. Commentaries: Any by the above authors, New American Commentary, Warren Wiersbe’s Bible Exposition Commentary, J. Vernon McGee’s Thru the Bible Commentary. History: Robert A. Baker, William Estep, Albert Newman. Pastoral: Hobbs Minister’s Manual, Criswell’s Guide for Pastors, Guide to Practical Pastoring by Sumner Wemp, Lectures to My Students by C. H. Spurgeon. Illustrations:… Read more »
Doug Hibbard,
If you are going to be a dyed-in-the wool Southern Baptist pastor, I suggest you take David R. Brumbelow’s book suggestions very seriously and read them all.
If you are going be a personally secure and confident Southern Baptist pastor, I suggest you take Dave Miller’s advice and read Liberating Ministry from the Success Syndrome by Kent Hughes.
If you are going to survive business meetings and deacon meetings and ambush meetings as a Southern Baptist pastor, I suggest you take cb’s advice and read The Art of War by Sun Tzu.
Haven’t read all of Brumbelow’s suggestions, but have read a few.
Have read Liberating Ministry from the Success Syndrome and some of Dave’s suggestions.
And I have read Sun Tzu, but not in the original language 🙂
The main thing I’m really going to try and grab from all this is a book or two on preaching. I’ve read a few, but not many. Might need to get better at that.
Doug Hibbard, If you are about to spend pastor’s salary money on books, I shall take a rare turn here and be serious for a moment and make three suggestions of books related to preaching that, in my opinion, will give you an adequate “bang for your buck.” * The Art and Craft of Biblical Preaching by Haddon Robinson and Craig Larson. * The 12 Essential Skills For Great Preaching by Wayne McDill. * The Preparation and Delivery of Sermons by John A. Broadus. The Broadus book is old and dated, but it is still a worthy book to read… Read more »
CB: I taught Dr. McDill’s 12 Essential Skills for Great Preaching in a seminary extension class back sometime between 2002-2004. I thoroughly enjoyed doing so. My collection of works on preaching probably amount to nearly 200 volumes. Our son studied Dr. McDill’s work under Dr. McDill himself…and introduced me to him (this was before I taught his work which added to my appreciation for the work and the professor). I have several works by Haddon Robinson and heard him speak at SEBTS, I think, by invitation of our son, when he was student there from ’95-99/ When were you there,… Read more »
Good stuff so far, and thank you to Mike Leake for making sure to jump to Hitler before the comment stream got past 25 comments.
There’s one in every crowd.
A “Hitler” in every crowd?
I just figure it’s never too early to just get to the point. Hitler was a non-Calvinist you know. LOL.
Oh, wow. this could get ugly.
Godwin’s law pops up here, too, apparently.
Hitler is a great proof of total depravity gone ape. His concentration camps, one in particular, gave me nightmares. A member of my second church had taken pictures of a smaller one with an old Browning Box camera, and he gave me his pictures to take home and study one night. Never again. Nightmares…..Horrors! I had nightmares, when I read what the inquisitors did to the Waldensians as well as the army that invaded their valleys. I also had nightmares when I read some of the original sources on slavery, while teaching at South Carolina State College, ’70-’72. By the… Read more »
Great and helpful article. I also appreciate that you addressed the reality of the self educated pastor. Seminary is not a viable option for everyone and it is certainly not a biblical requirement. 1.) Knowing God by J.I. Packer 2.) Preaching that Changes Lives by Mike Fabarez 3.) What Every Christian Ought To Know by Adrian Rogers 4.) Charles Spurgeon 5.) Too many to name: Albert Mohler, Mark Denver, Adam Dooley, Jerry Vines 6.) Table talk – the devotional R.C. Sproul’s group puts out. 7.) Don’t just study your Bible looking for sermons and lessons but for personal growth first.… Read more »
I have Packer’s Knowing God right here on the computer table with the computer. I have a work or two by Adrian Rogers and one by his wife. Spurgeon, I all of his NPSP & MTP, Treasury of David, and many other works. I also have Packer’s Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God, Sproul’s Knowing Scripture…and some other items.
Here are my thoughts on your questions: It may be good to note my situation so that context will help know where I’m coming from… I have no formal education past High School, I’ve been in ministry for 25 years, I grew up in the west, and I pastor in the west (at current church for 11 years) 1. I would recommend (and do give) “Brothers, We Are Not Professionals” John Piper 2. This is not a book on preaching, but Joseph Alleine’s book “Alarm to the Unconverted” has influenced my preaching more than any other. 3. John Bunyan, “The… Read more »
> John Bunyan, “The Holy War”
I’m glad to see I’m not the only one who has read this (though I’ll admit that what I’ve read is Ethel Barrett’s re-telling of it).
Ethel Barrett’s reading of the “War for Mansoul” is priceless.
Our son got me a set of the complete works of Bunyan about 20 years ago. He stands to inherit it, when I slip the mortal coil. By the way you can download all 22 volumes of the old Puritan Thomas Manton. Wow! Along with Sibbes, Clarkson, Bridges, Burroughs, etc. Just google Puritan works online. One of the sites has a slew of them on line.