Is BSOP Practical Enough?

Rev. Jay Hallowell

“On Thursday can you come and bless my new tricycle[1],” a church member asked a Filipino friend of mine, in his very first week as a new pastor at a provincial church, having just graduated from a seminary (not BSOP).

My friend said he didn’t know what to do.  He shared this story as an example of a way where he thought his seminary should improve.  And the group we were meeting with easily came up with a number of similar examples where we thought the seminary had not really prepared us for what we were asked to do when we began full-time service.

I have only had the privilege of teaching at BSOP for four years out of its first 50.  During this short period some BSOP graduates have told me that they have also felt that BSOP did not prepare them well enough for what they would experience in their first church.  And I have heard some church members who have said that they sometimes wished that BSOP had prepared some graduates better.  BSOP, somehow, hasn’t always been seen as practical enough, at least in some of its first 50 years.

But, as I reflected on my Filipino pastor friend’s story, I began to think about it a different way.  I began to ask some myself some questions.  Was Jesus practical?  In the sermon Jesus preached on a mountain in Galilee, Jesus listed nine blessings (Matthew 5:3-12).  Why did he leave out “Blessed are those who have a new tricycle?” (Replace the word ‘tricycle’ with your favorite relative, business, possession, profession, or whatever.)

Jesus is often considered the best seminary professor who ever lived.  The way he trained his disciples for ministry, both to their own people and to people of every culture, is brilliant.

Yet, Jesus forgot to teach His disciples how to bless a tricycle.

Well, perhaps Paul, another very good seminary professor, did better.  Or, did he?  In writing younger workers like Timothy and Titus, for example, he also seems to have skipped the lesson on blessing tricycles. 

Jesus and Paul also forgot to train their students in how to perform a wedding, or a funeral, or, if it comes to that, a worship service.  They taught nothing about managing a Sunday school, choir, home Bible studies, or a building project.  There seem to be no lessons on sermon preparation, or visitation, or counseling, or youth ministry.  It would be very easy to add to this list of things churches expect their workers to do that are not included in the Bible.

So, maybe Jesus and Paul weren’t such good seminary professors. 

Or maybe they were.  Perhaps it is the owner of the new tricycle who isn’t a very good church member. 

I wonder if the tricycle owner ever asked my friend, “How can I become more holy?” (The main question Jesus answered in His Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5-7.), or, “Can you help me to live God’s way and be shaped up for the tasks God has for me?”  (Paul in 2 Timothy 3:16-17, see below). 

Had the tricycle owner asked these questions, I wonder if my friend would have been prepared by his seminary to answer them?  I think so.  I wonder if I am managing to teach the students in my classes how to do so?  I hope so.

At the BIBLICAL Seminary of the Philippines, we make every effort to teach our students about Jesus and Paul (and of course, the rest of the Bible).  That is a very high part of our calling.  BSOP graduates will continue to go to a variety of ministries in a variety of places, we pray, for another 50 years.  I hope and pray that they will be practical in their ministries like Jesus’ disciples and like Paul’s.  May God use them to make disciples of every nation (Matthew 28:19), even if the ‘tricycle drivers’ in their churches don’t necessarily ask them to do so.