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Feature Article #1

Train for Godliness at Seminary

1 Timothy 4:7-8 - Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths. Rather train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.
Why are you at seminary? If you are [...]

Popularity: 7% [?]

Mark | August 18th, 2008 | Continued

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Feature Article #2

Master Your Seminary’s Required Reading in Half the Time (or Less)

Seminary requires a massive amount of reading. Often the workload for even a single course can go over a thousand pages. Multiply that by four or five, and it becomes daunting, especially if you’re not a natural reader. The numbers of people who struggle with reading seems to be growing, and I’m [...]

Popularity: 18% [?]

Mark | August 11th, 2008 | Continued

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Feature Article #3

Live Off Campus

Seminary housing is often more affordable than comparable accommodations in surrounding communities, and it is definitely more convenient.
However, there is a snare associated with it. Seminary is not the real world. It is a bubble, insulated both physically and ideologically from the lost culture in which it stands. In one sense, this [...]

Popularity: 20% [?]

Mark | August 7th, 2008 | Continued

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Feature Article #4

Attending Seminary Means Living In a Foreign Land

When I went to seminary, it entailed a move from Florida to Texas. There was a shift in geography, but there was also a shift in culture-a pretty dramatic shift, as anyone who’s moved to Texas will probably tell you.
I grew up in South Florida. I was a native Floridian, which was pretty [...]

Popularity: 46% [?]

Mark | July 21st, 2008 | Continued

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Feature Article #5

Avoid the “Seminary Church”

Particularly around larger seminaries, you’ll find what I call the “seminary church.” It’s almost always a large church. Often it’s close to the campus. Many professors and students attend it. The culture and theology of the seminary often bleeds over into the church. For seminary students, it’s a comfy place to be.
There were a few [...]

Popularity: 60% [?]

Mark | July 17th, 2008 | Continued

About this Site

My name is Mark, and I’m the general editor for Seminary Survival Guide. I’m a graduate of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (M.Div, 1995) and I’m serving as associate pastor at First Baptist Church of Columbia, Illinois.
I got the idea for this lying in bed praying one morning. Our church has several seminary students, [...]

Popularity: unranked [?]

Other Recent Articles

You’re a Victim of Triage (and upcoming posts!)

August 5th, 2008 • Mark • 1 comment • Related • Filed Under

Regular readers of Seminary Survival Guide have noticed that my posting has been slow of late. My explanation is that I’ve been practicing what I preach.

One key concept I believe it’s critical for Christian leaders to master is triage: knowing how to sort through a welter of urgent demands and determine what is truly important.

Triage means “to sort.” It is a practice used in emergency medicine to determine which cases will receive immediate treatment. In a battlefield hospital overwhelmed with casualties, hard decisions have to be made. Some soldiers will get medical treatment immediately, and their lives will be saved. Some have less severe injuries that can wait, and others who are terribly wounded and cannot be saved, are made comfortable and left to die.

Triage is about making hard choices about how you use your limited time and resources. See its application to ministry and seminary here

And of late, since issues have been pressing at my primary job, so I have put Seminary Survival Guide in the “wait” column. I expect this won’t be the last time.

I expect that you will do the same. I don’t expect you to read SSG when you have exams to study for and haven’t spent any time with your spouse. You can always come back and catch up. All posts are archived by category, with the most recent ones at the top. We’ll be here when you get back.

This site, both for me and for you, is meant to be a servant, not a master. It’s up to us both to see that doesn’t happen.

Having said that, look for two upcoming posts:
“Live Off Campus” will provide an argument for why living at seminary is bad for you.
And “Master Your Seminary’s Required Reading in Half the Time (or Less)” will show you a simple technique used at Oxford University and other graduate programs for fast mastery of reading material.

More:
Seminary Does Not Prepare You for Ministry
Seminary DOES Prepare You for Ministry

Popularity: 22% [?]

Thinking of Seminary?

July 7th, 2008 • Mark • 0 comments • Related • Filed Under

During the summer, some folks are finalizing plan to begin seminary in the Fall. Whether you’re on your way, or thinking about it, here’s a summary of our series on calling to ministry.

Make Sure You’re Supposed to Be Here

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Sounding the Call

Part Four

The Calling to Ministry Self-Assessment (pdf)

And as a bonus:

Is “Calling” a Biblical Idea?

Popularity: 64% [?]

“Learn to…” Series Summary

June 30th, 2008 • Mark • 0 comments • Related • Filed Under

To tide you over as I’m traveling the next few weeks, here’s our completed contributions so far to the series, Things that you should learn while in Seminary that Seminary will not teach you:

Learn to Pray

Learn to Share Your Faith

Learn to Submit to Authority

Learn to Love People

Learn to Exercise

Learn to Confess Your Sins

Popularity: 69% [?]

DTS Bloggers United!

June 29th, 2008 • Mark • 0 comments • Related • Filed Under

I was happy to see that John Saddington, a 3rd year Dallas Theological Seminary student,  has started an aggregator site for DTS bloggers.

You can find it at theologyblogs.com.

Popularity: 65% [?]

Going to Seminary

June 18th, 2008 • Mark • 0 comments • Related • Filed Under

If you haven’t yet checked out goingtoseminary.com, it’s a great resource for current and future seminary students. They have several current seminarians writing for the site. You can find lots of good counsel on a variety of subjects, and a engaging community, to boot.

Ryan, the GTS webmaster, has been very helpful to me personally in getting this site up and going.

The newest development is that I will occasionally be contributing some content for them. I wrote a piece on Sustaining Relationships that just posted over at GTS. Head over and check it out!

Popularity: 88% [?]

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