Teaching Theology

Stability

I once claimed for our college that “our faculty are very stable”. Some wag asked whether I meant that as a comment on their length of service to the college or their psychology!

Stability (in the first sense) is a rare thing today with our very mobile society. Few stay in the same place in the same job for many years. Indeed, theological education institutions are presently finding problems with their very specific courses introduced in the last ten years (youth ministry, mission studies, worship, counselling, sport ministry etc.) because, in the lifetime of a servant of God, they can begin as a worship leader, become a youth leader, go abroad as a cross cultural missionary, come home to become a church pastor and even eventually end up in a college teaching. We need a very solid base in biblical and theological studies within any such “specific” courses in order to facilitate the current practice.

Stability is actually an ancient Christian practice, especially in the monastic tradition and was often taken as a vow in addition to poverty, chastity and obedience, or seen as a sub-heading under the category of obedience. For the monk it meant that, except by a dispensation of his superiors, he must remain in the monastery of his profession. This is in massive contrast to our present society and, famously, Thomas Merton struggled with this element in his commitment.

And yet, stability is a Christian practice. It says that we are not those who assume that the grass is greener elsewhere, that, just with a change of external circumstances, we can solve our internal restlessness and weaknesses, that covenant means covenant and commitment means commitment. It is a denial of the search for perfection elsewhere and the getting on with making what we have more perfect. We tend to agree with this concerning marriage. Marriage is for life, for better for worse. Not every commitment is so covenantal but it would be a good idea if we, as Christians in a consumer culture, regarded our membership of a local congregation more in that light. As Spurgeon once said to someone who was moving around churches looking for the perfect church “If you do find the perfect church, please don’t join it for then it would no longer be perfect”.

But what of those of us in theological education? The commitment to serve in a college or seminary is not covenantal like marriage. We must not be seduced into a rigidity of life by a thoughtless commitment to stability. Sometimes in our job as a theological educator a move is right and good – if only for the sake of the rest of the faculty! A career move can sometimes be right for better fulfilment of a calling which also may be changing and growing, or even for growing influence for the kingdom. There are other good resons for moving on. But should we not deliberately inject the concept of stability into all our thinking about such change? Stability helps us face our weaknesses, grow in usefulness where we are and blesses the college with continuity of ministry.

It is often the best choice among other options.

This entry was posted on October 30, 2017 at 9:13 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.