Vision Builders Spring 2016

MAKING A DIFFERENCE For a gift of $100 or more to the Bethel Fund (the gap fund between the student’s education costs and what the student pays) we will send you this 4-color commentary on Matthew, by Professor of New Testament Jeannine Brown, as a thank you.

6116 Arosa Street San Diego, California 92115

SEND GIFTS TO: Bethel Seminary San Diego Office of Development 3900 Bethel Drive St. Paul, MN 55112

IN MEMORY OF DAVID PRICE On January 13, 2016, Bethel lost a dear friend. David Price was a key figure in the development of Bethel Seminary San Diego in the late 1970s. He chaired the first building campaign, which was completed in 1990, and then the second building campaign, which was completed in 2013. He served on the Board of Trustees of Bethel University and the Executive Board of Bethel Seminary because he had a passion for training church leaders for the next generation.

He was generous in his time and finances because he believed that Bethel in San Diego could play a strategic role in bringing the Gospel to the nations.

We will miss David’s vision and his continual encouragement to stay focused on our calling. We need others who will fill the void that David leaves behind, and find fulfillment in supporting others who will live out God’s mission.

(The Bethel Board of Trustees has named the San Diego seminary chapel the “David & Mary Ann Price Chapel” in his memory)

VISIONBUILDERS FOR DONORS, FRIENDS, AND ALUMNI OF BETHEL SEMINARY SAN DIEGO

SPRING 2016

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bethel.edu/seminary

DEAN’S CORNER Being “missional” is what drives the vision of Bethel Seminary. I like Don Evert’s definition— “Missional Christians are marked by and caught up in God’s mission in the world.” That means wherever in our world God puts us, that is where we need to live with a sense of mission. For Bethel Seminary San Diego, that sense of mission is what motivates our existence as an evangelical seminary. Two key words need definition: “missional” and “evangelical.”

The funny part is that “missional” is not even a word in the dictionary (at least not yet). And the term “evangelical” is the most misunderstood word in the news today. To quote Ed Stetzer in Breaking the Missional Code, “For many, evangelicals have become a voting block rather than a spiritual force.” Yet the terms “missional” and “evangelical” should be complimentary.

When we are committed to the Gospel (Gr. evangelion translated “good news” or “evangelical”) we seek to live with a sense of mission and be in places where we can be a spiritual force.

This semester, in partnership with College Avenue Baptist Church, we started a non-credit, Spanish certificate program we call “pre-seminary training.” It is for pastors and church leaders who are mostly bi-vocational, cannot qualify for seminary, but need the help that a seminary can give. We had more than 40 people register for the courses and their excitement in class is

infectious. We use our Spanish-speaking graduates to teach some of the course. We are not doing this to generate income, but to be missional.

Matt Herbst S’12 started a Bible school in Malawi for rural pastors who don’t have access to Bible training, and therefore avoid teaching from it.

Living out God’s mission in his world means dealing with practitioners of witchcraft who use black magic to put curses on people, with death and tragic accidents often following in their wake. Despite the many obstacles, Matt is able to see clearly how the power of the Gospel is victorious over the power of Satan.

Previously, we have told you stories of students doing church planting or suicide counseling—all strategic ministries, and all living out God’s mission in the world. We are training church leaders in denominations who have lost their evangelical commitments, because that’s part of our mission. In this issue we will tell you about a student in our new mental health counseling program and about another doing prison ministry.

We have hundreds of stories to tell about students living out God’s call to be missional. We also want you to be inspired to be missional—both in your giving and in your service. For when we are caught up in God’s mission in our world, we discover the joy of being God’s “good news” (evangelion) people.

Arnell Motz Dean & Executive Officer

ADDICTION TO FREEDOM Bethel Seminary San Diego not only prepares students for traditional ministerial roles, it also equips them to start their own ministries where they see a need—often before they even graduate.

Joshua Lee, 33, is just one example. As a mental health counseling student, he is already putting his seminary education into practice by helping people who struggle with sexual addictions. Josh cites research showing that while 88% of pastors believe pornography is a major issue in their churches, only seven percent offer programs to help. He wants to change that. “I founded a group at Chinese Evangelical Church of San Diego called ‘Purity,’ which began its first group-therapy session last spring,” he says. “The group combines elements of traditional practices of Catholic confession, Protestant evangelical theology, and techniques of modern psychology.”

Josh understands what it’s like to battle this issue on his own. The son of a Chinese evangelical pastor, he struggled with a pornography addiction for 20 years before he knew help was available.

After he mustered the courage to ask for prayer, a friend led him to the Men’s Sexual Integrity Group at Flood Church. “Before hearing of this group, I had never known that such support groups existed,” says Josh. “I grew up in first-generation, Chinese-immigrant churches, and such things were never discussed.”

Before finding the support group, Josh hid his addiction because he thought no one would understand. But in the safety of the group, he found that he was not alone. “Never in my life had I seen that many men coming together and openly confessing their sins and vulnerably exposing their brokenness,” he says. “I was able to relate to each and every testimony.”

When it was Josh’s turn to share his story with the group, he was terrified, but the group’s support strengthened him. Now he gives his testimony publically to help others. “My story started when I was just eleven years old and was exposed to pornography online. Then as a teenager, my father was wrongfully terminated and we lost everything,” he says. “In the span of a single day, I found myself without a church, my father without a job, and my family without a home.”

The betrayal was spiritually and emotionally

MINISTRY IN A DARK PLACE damaging, Josh says, demolishing his faith in God and the church and leading him to turn to pornography to cope. The trauma resulted in him failing his first year of university, destroying his plans for medical school.

But God had new plans for him, plans that included a new home and a new family at Bethel Seminary. “Bethel provides a community that is like a family,” he says. “Next to the church I grew up in, it has been the most familial.”

Josh is using his seminary training to further the ministry that was miraculously healing for him. “When I went through my struggles,” he says, “I told myself that I wanted to help other men with this issue.” He’s started by learning to adapt sexual addiction support programs to fit the culture of the Asian-American church. “As I lead purity groups and begin new ones, a single thought is always at the forefront,” he explains. “I hope one day to produce a well-structured system that is adaptable to any Asian-American church and flexible enough to take on the challenges of individual needs.”

Josh says the addiction that almost destroyed his life is now redefining it. “The coping mechanism I used became the reason I wanted to go to seminary and study mental health counseling,” he says. “Ironically, what was once the greatest source of my pain and disorientation has now become the greatest driving force behind my life purpose.”

He’s grateful to Bethel Seminary for fostering a safe and welcoming environment where he’s been able to grow. “This is a place where I finally felt like it was okay to explore and clarify my thoughts about God, without feeling like I’m being judged for not knowing things because my dad’s a pastor,” Josh says. “I still remember the words on the cover of the folder I received at seminary orientation: ‘Begin. Belong. Become.’ Bethel has really embodied this motto for me. They have provided a place for me to begin my new journey, a community that has given me a sense of belonging, and the scholarship for me to become a counselor.”

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Meet Aaron Buttery, an M.Div. student at Bethel Seminary San Diego, who works with the inmates of Donovan State Correctional Facility near San Diego, one of the toughest prisons in the country. He enters the foreboding prison gates three days a week, into a place most people would fear to go. Why does he do it?

“Three years ago my call to ministry was fatefully discovered through mere curiosity, when a woman approached me at church one Sunday and started talking to me about prison ministry,” he says. “To this day I can’t say what enticed my interest. All I can say is once I stepped inside the prison chapel at Donovan, my life as I had known it was over.”

Aaron recalls how he stood in the middle of the chapel and felt transported into something new.

“No longer was I in a barren building, but was instantly immersed in the overwhelming presence of the Holy Spirit,” he says. “It was an experience so powerful, no mind can imagine it until the soul has experienced it.”

Up to this time, Aaron had been working at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, a job he had once viewed as amazing but that had morphed into something dull and empty in comparison to what God was opening up before him. As he was doing his rounds at the power plant, he would wonder, “What am I doing here when my heart is so filled with joy at Donovan, when my thoughts are captured by these broken people? I would be a fool not to go after what has captured my heart.”

So Aaron enrolled at Bethel Seminary to pursue his calling to prison ministry. “Ever since I embarked on my pastoral journey, I can’t tell you how many times God has met me in and through my ministry at Donovan,” he says. “He constantly reminds me that he is the God of the impossible by continually making a way where there seems to be none. During the past two years of service, I have seen God revive hundreds of men, witnessing miracle after miracle.”

Aaron considers his ministry one of presence.

“When I interact with the inmates,” he says, “many of whom have been abandoned, rejected, or discarded by society or their families, my ministry is simply one of presence. It’s to stand in the void

and say, ‘I’m here and I love you.’”

Is he ever afraid? “I’m not scared of many men inside of the prison,” says Aaron, “but when Guy walked into the chapel, I was terrified. It wasn’t because he was a huge or intimidating man; it was because he had a look on his face that clearly said, ‘I have nothing to lose and I don’t care about anything or anyone.’ This was a cold and hardened man who had not smiled in years. He entered the chapel as a ‘skinhead,’ angry at the idea of God, but after going through our four-day program, Guy accepted Jesus, completely transforming his life.

During the next four months, I had the privilege of witnessing God transform Guy into a man filled with joy. Now whenever I see Guy, he has a smile on his face and a twinkle in his eye. Throughout my time at the prison, I’ve seen the lives of many men changed, but none as dramatically as Guy’s.

Witnessing his baptism was a powerful moment for me—a moment where I realized that because of Christ, I loved Guy, and I realized my deep love for all the inmates.”

Aaron credits his Bethel education with providing the tools to pursue his call to prison ministry. “Thanks to the grace of God and my education at Bethel, whether it is preaching on Sunday, leading worship, directing a Bible study, interceding in prayer, or providing counsel, I am growing into the spiritual leader and pastoral shepherd God created me to be.”

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