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The title Of today's lecture is the view from 50,000 ft, the futures of theological education. Mm In my title for this lecture series and today's lecture, you will notice the aviation metaphor of 50,000 ft.

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I borrowed the metaphor from organizational guru, David Allen , whose book getting things done, The art of stress free productivity is entrenched in business book cannons as being a go to source for developing a system of

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organization for oneself and one's organization. And by the way, I would totally recommend it for churches, organizations and individuals, pastures or seminarians or seeking to have a better grasp of how to organize one's life

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and work. He uses different elevations to describe the various perspective from which we can view one's life and work. The 50,000 ft level, the one that I used in my title helps you to address the

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big issues of life. For example, what is my purpose? Whereas the runway level begs the question , what is the next action? Respond to Jaime's email, read the report for my next meeting,

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callback bob, etcetera. That's a runway. The 40,000 ft level, 10,000 ft under the 50 ft view is the 3 to 5 year horizon, which for Allen describes the larger trends in one's industry and

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social world. Today's lecture is climbing to around 45,000 ft. Somewhere between the larger trends and the bigger questions of life is Allen recommends it is a good discipline in life and in work to regularly pull back

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and view your current situation from the broader perspective. To take time to elevate your sightline so that you can see your current situation and goals given the broader horizon of your life and the work to which you

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are committed. So yesterday, I invoke the spirit of David Bowie. When we looked at the dramatic changes within the currents of theological education. It was a sober and I hope yet hopeful look at the

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present tense of our situation. Today, we turn our eyes to the future. Or, as my title indicates, a political futures of theological education. I won't impact that plural so much today. But

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let us note that it is a plural when I see where we are headed in. Theological education is not a singular vision. It is multiple, it is legion. But before we set our gaze,

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before we set our gaze toward what is on the horizon before us. It is important to understand the forces or the deep currents that lie underneath the surface of these waves of destruction in this ocean of change

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. So you can never really take the surfer out of out of it. You can take the surfer out of California, but you can never take the surfer out of the surf. You know what I

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mean? That wasn't in the script, the broader context. Let me let me expound upon the changing place and influence of religion and religious institutions in public life. The Pew survey has taught us much about

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the nuns and guns. The nuns are the non affiliated, the fastest growing segment of religious or spiritually oriented people in the US are the non affiliated or those who choose not to be associated with any particular

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religious tradition, Nuns make up a 5th of the entire US. population and 1/3 of young adults under 30. These young adults also known as the millennial generation. And these numbers are growing now I called

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the nuns religious or spiritually oriented people. That's actually my term. Not not not pews because it would be a mistake to say that this heterogeneous group is predominantly secular or non believing. In fact 2/3 of

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the nonaffiliated believe in God, more than a third of them would say that they are spiritual, though not religious, And about 20% of them say they pray daily. That being said, there is no

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indication that these folks will be lining up to be the next wave of presbyterians. Episcopalians, evangelicals are roman Catholics anytime soon. I think, given the current environment and place of religion hidden underneath all of

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our politics, I don't expect that it not only will not change, but it will probably decline more . Many churches, some successfully, but mostly not , has sought to reach out to this group of

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young people, but research indicates that they are not joiners of our traditional religious institutions. So here's a freebie. I have a lot of freebies in this lecture today. So this is just one I just

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cast out there for all of you. Many not affiliated are participating in religious institutions. They're not joining , but many of them are participating. They're trying them out churches, seminaries, faith based nonprofits,

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but they will likely, but they likely will not show up on membership rules or stewardship drives in order for them to be donors. We first have to give them good steady employment. So here's the first

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freebie. Let them work, give them jobs and jobs with a livable wage. And I'm not speaking just to the broader society here. I'm talking about the church. We put a tremendous load of debt

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on this generations back and the backs of their parents , all in the name of higher education, an education that used to lead to employment and productive citizenship . It's time friends to let them lead, let

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them lead us. They very well could be the Joshua's the Caleb's the rehabs of this generation, the generation who looks on the land of promised and unlike the previous generation sees not giants defeat and death,

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but a land flowing with milk and honey, a fulfillment of promise and not of possession or extraction. Thank you dr jenny. A generation who sees ignores the impossibility of the walls erected around the city and

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lets the revolutionary element pass in secret of night. It is time to pass the torch to hand the baton over to those who will anchor the next leg of this race. That's the 1st Freebie. Here's

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the 2nd Freebie or advice that I'm going to give even though you didn't ask for it rather than falling back on our members only model of religious practice. Why not join them In many ways. The 21st

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century congregation is finding its voice again on the streets , in the public square knot in the pulpit or in the pews, but at the erected podium of the protest or the walking mass of humanity that seeks

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a justice that is greater than our poll, polarized political stalemates. If we want to partner with the future, we need to let them lead even as we walk side by side with them, side by

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side, not in front, not pushing from behind , but side by side with them, witnessing to the legacies of faith that inform our march. If we want to be mentors and elders of a movement

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, we must serve with not take charge. And then perhaps maybe this generation will discover for itself the wealth of resources within our faith traditions that lend themselves to movement making to live as a prophet, Micah

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exhorts us to do justice, to love mercy and to walk humbly with our God. I was struck by this example and this legacy that gets passed on , even if it doesn't feel like it's getting passed

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on. When I was talking with my oldest son , he's now 26 Going on 27 and we were taking a long drive. It was, he was at that time in young adulthood. So he's asking

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questions of purpose and meaning and direction. And he was telling me after his, I think it was after his second year of college, he was driving around in the Chicago area and he said to me

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dad, I don't know what has just revived in me, what has this fire that's been lit in my heart? But I'm on college campuses, I'm so dissatisfied and I want to bring justice now now

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he doesn't attend a church regularly. And he was asking me, where do I get this from? And I just sat there quietly and listen And I quoted Micah 6 8, he says, that's it

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. I said it's in the bible, he's all dharam, Mhm. He was a prophet and he didn't know it. Let them lead. And the freebies, all of these data point to a growing

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lack of confidence in religious institutions, even as religion continues to be hiding in the background of much of our political and social debates. Now, religion is far from gone in the public sphere. Its role

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in place in society has just changed. Or, as dr Kittredge said, has gone underground or behind the scenes when it actually should be in the front . But the role of religion, it's almost impossible

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not to see has changed. Perhaps irreversibly, yesterday we did a brief exercise in which we closed our eyes and imagine a typical seminary and seminarian. It is likely that those images emerged from the ground were

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grounded in memories of what we remember from our days in church In the middle of the 20th century, the church was still a central place in both the town square and in the public eye, Pastors held

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positions of esteem and local communities and we looked to be voices, looked at to be voices of conscious and moral authority within the community. Parishioners would turn to them on matters of politics, social and family

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life in ways that people don't today. The church itself was seen as a place where all of these things were held together, the social glue of our existence. That's why it was in the center of

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the square. Today. Church competes with many other allegiances, including sunday soccer, in little League games . There are many forces that led up to this growing distrust of religious institutions and we don't have enough

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time today to unpack those forces, but we all experience them every single sunday. It is also important for us to recognize this when we consider the underlying currents that are moving us downstream in a certain direction

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toward the future that we still don't know. These currents have precedence. They have a rationale, they are real and they're not going away anytime soon and they affect all of us in the world of theological

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education. Since the missions of our schools all seek to form leaders for the church and society. That's one current. There's another current that goes side by side if not crosswise through this current of the diminishing

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role of religion in public life and that is, there are forces of change in higher education. The most obvious effect of these changes can be seen in the rising cost of higher education. We provide a

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personal example again of a college visit with the same oldest son. Ah I have some personal experience of these rising costs of higher education as I have put my two millennial Children through college. What used to

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be a retirement nest egg is now an adequate down payment on tuition, recruiting was less. When we did these recruiting visits, there were less discernment and more a marketing pitch which included plush apartments, amazing

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dormitories or at least what we used to call dorms . And these are really individual luxury apartments and these expansive athletic centers were that rival. In fact just puts a shame these gyms that we see on every

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other corner dining halls with top chefs and all of this comes at a cost. All of those buildings and the perpetual cranes that are erected on most campuses across the country come with a price tag and those

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price tags require donors and those donors need a fundraiser . And those fundraisers at least the typical research one university have large corporate size salaries and as the cashier rings up the total in the grocery line of your

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higher education experience, she says, your total comes to a lifetime of debt. But there's another force beyond the higher the rising cost of higher education. There's another force on the horizon and higher education.

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The impending decline of enrollments. The atlantic ran an article last summer stating that quote, the United States is running out of teenagers unquote. Since 2010, total enrollments of degree granting postsecondary institutions has declined from

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just over 21 million, two under 20 million, or just under 5%. The millennial bubble is complete and the next generation on its heels is just now entering undergraduate school, which results currently in less demand

00:15:41.330 - 00:15:56.140

for higher education. When one couple's this with the growing number of colleges, universities and technical schools, it is not a stretch to assume that we are heading into a period of consolidation and higher education and

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in general in education, this decline in the number of students attending undergraduate institutions will have an effect on all of us who are in graduate education. So seminaries are at the intersection of these two currents,

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These two forces of change, These two forces of higher ed and the Church. This is why it should not surprise us when the dominant theme that we hear from all of at schools is change, but

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there's something particular and unique about the changes that we are experiencing to provide this context of change. I'm appealing now that thomas Friedman, a columnist for the new york Times who calls this an age of accelerations

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. The full title of his new book is thank you for being late, An optimist's guide to thriving in an age of accelerations. In some ways, his new book is not very new. He ruminates

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on our current situation, addressing the kinds of issues that one would assume from Friedman, how to manage our lives of technology, naming the threats and new realities in what he calls a post post Cold War

00:17:11.340 - 00:17:26.450

, climate change etcetera etcetera etcetera. These are kind of Friedman's obvious tropes, these big changes are what freedom argues characterize this age of acceleration. Not only are we changing, but we are changing rapidly and

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in profound ways to give a sense of how the world is changing. Here's a quote from one of his earlier works And I'm quoting here in 2005 Facebook didn't exist for most people think about that one was

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a life without facebook ever. Reality twitter was still the sound the cloud was something in the sky. Three G noticed three G instead of five Gr lt three G was a parking space. Applications were what

00:18:00.140 - 00:18:18.120

you sent to colleges and Skype was a typo end quote. This is not just a change from a post industrial economy to a tech economy, This, my friends is a new world. We are living

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in an accelerated time where change is not just an addition to our life, but is a multiplying factor of it. Changes happening at a faster pace, increasing our ability to do certain things and complicating our

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lives exponentially in other ways, but now and by the way that but is a disjunctive for those of you, hebrew purists, but as I stated in my earlier lecture, changes. Nothing new to the

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church into theological education. In fact, change. Indeed, faithful change is a part of our DNA as people of God. So what are these pathways of change? Let me first turn to reflections about

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faithful change. A christian reclamation of the notion of innovation or what Greg jones, formerly the Faith and Leadership Center at Duke University, is called Tradition and Innovation. Innovation literature on innovation has increased in recent

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decades. Much of this literature comes out of business schools, notably Harvard Business School Stanford Graduate School of Business, just to name a couple. Innovation and also has become a buzzword in our larger cultural ethos

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. But there are industries and organizational theorists who have thought long and hard about innovation and how to structure change in a way that can transform those organizations. Innovation simply defined is the structure or process of introducing

00:19:56.930 - 00:20:18.390

change. Innovation can provide continuity or discontinuity. Clayton Christensen, renowned innovation professor at Harvard Business School has distinguished between sustaining and disruptive innovations, sustaining innovations, are those changes that help us do what we do

00:20:18.400 - 00:20:36.930

better. For an example, digital technology and I actually disagree with Christiansen on this point, Kristiansen, when he wrote a book on higher ed and disruptive innovation, assume that digital technologies was going to disrupt

00:20:36.930 - 00:20:55.000

the industry, closing colleges and universities, I would argue that it is a sustaining innovation, It helps us do better what we've already done. So an example of sustaining innovation, I'm arguing is digital technology

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and distance learning in higher education. Most assumed that this would be a disruptive force, as I said in education, but it is not supplanted traditional modes of education. It is enhanced how schools can offer

00:21:07.060 - 00:21:26.510

education. It is therefore by very definition sustaining, disruptive innovation, Christensen argues, by contrast, is an innovation that completely overturns an industry or way of doing things. Examples include the effect of amazon or

00:21:26.510 - 00:21:45.540

online shopping to bricks and mortar retailers. Many in higher education assumed disruptive potential and things like moocs or massive open online courses. For example, what's offered at Harvard's X is dr Walton mentioned yesterday, these

00:21:45.540 - 00:21:57.710

courses could have disrupted higher ed because they offered for free what would cost thousands or tens of thousands of dollars in a traditional course format at a university. But I maintain that at least now digital technologies are

00:21:57.710 - 00:22:17.360

a sustaining innovation within higher education in faith communities. Innovation often resides between the two poles of one a received legacy or tradition, and to the renewal of this legacy through non traditional form structures or faith practices

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. Now, as presbyterians within the reformed tradition, this concept should be nothing new to us being a people who are, as we say, to ourselves , reformed and always reforming, notice continuity, discontinuity

00:22:33.270 - 00:22:52.420

, the legacy and innovation of that statement. Change and innovation are required in faith communities to give them relevance within their changing landscapes, to breathe new life into old lungs of tradition. Greg jones, who

00:22:52.420 - 00:23:08.910

I mentioned earlier sites, jaroslav Pelikan, to differentiate tradition from traditionalism, Pelikan says, and I'm quoting tradition is the living faith of the Dead. Let me rephrase that first half their tradition is the living

00:23:08.910 - 00:23:29.510

faith of the dead. Traditionalism is the dead faith of the living. one Additional thought about innovation. From a christian reform perspective, we must avoid the danger of seeing innovation as a purely human exercise in

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engineering the future. I'm getting theological on you, scripture teaches us often and repeatedly that both the future and the changes that shape that future belong in the hands of God. Think back to our example yesterday

00:23:45.390 - 00:24:00.950

, from the book of Acts chapter 10 and 11 , the human tendency for we christians is to establish Jerusalem councils, authoritative bodies that seek to oversee and control the future trajectory of the mission of God.

00:24:02.340 - 00:24:19.060

But these institutions not minimizing their importance. We need institutions, these institutions, when elevated to the level of a fundamentalist IQ, authoritative structure for the life of the people of God becomes symbols of idolatry,

00:24:21.040 - 00:24:34.910

giving reverence to the structure and not to the God of the structure. God supplies the innovation in Acts 10, when the Holy Spirit falls on the gentiles , requiring the conversion of the church to the mission

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of God and a rethinking of the ideology of the structure. Given that our priority assumption that God is the source of innovation for the future. Let me offer some reflections of how I see innovation and how

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it has taken shape in most my most recent experience in one of our Pc USA schools. Now, I'm not trying to share some proprietary advice here. These are just some reflections and principles for leading change

00:25:10.740 - 00:25:26.040

. I'm going to conclude on this note, given that my time is a little shorter this morning than it was yesterday, I offer these five principles of leading change and I conclude with these as principles that

00:25:26.040 - 00:25:40.230

might help us think about changes in theological schools. They are by no means definitive. I shared these first at the 80 s Presidential intensive in Pittsburgh in december, and they have now been published in our

00:25:40.230 - 00:25:52.090

most recent 80 s online newsletter colloquy. So if you want to see the kind of more full explanation , you can read those the based on the rapid and profound change that is confronting our institutions. How

00:25:52.090 - 00:26:07.110

do we lead, how do we lead in times of change? I've always appreciated leadership literature including that um including that which we have published at A. T. S. As a new president. The

00:26:07.110 - 00:26:22.560

book a handbook for seminary presidents who was my bible for administrative leadership. It was written by seminary presidents and deans and seminary presidents and they reflected in different chapters on the life and work of seminary presidents.

00:26:22.440 - 00:26:37.290

And this literature is often written, I must admit , from the perspective of a stable institution, not from a changing one. So I think we need to update it. The topics in the book are

00:26:37.300 - 00:26:52.200

all important, casting, vision, fundraising, being an academic leader, being a cultural leader, providing clarity of mission etcetera. However, there is an importance and urgency to how we lead differently in times

00:26:52.200 - 00:27:07.910

of change. So a little bit of context to these five principles. For six years, I served as president, the first asian american president to serve a press between church USA Seminary and the first person

00:27:07.910 - 00:27:26.090

of color has served in this role at McCormick Seminary . When I departed in 2017, the school had increased its racial ethnic faculty composition, 80% of the , of the, of the new hires that we

00:27:26.090 - 00:27:45.010

had on faculty were faculty of color without decreasing the overall head counts among our faculty. Students of colour had grown to about 80% of the student body, 55% were African American Presbyterians made up about 15 to

00:27:45.020 - 00:27:59.550

18 of the student body. And again, let me just reiterate. This is not a nondenominational school . This is not an evangelical school. This is a piece USA school. Our second fastest growing population

00:28:00.040 - 00:28:17.670

was Latina Pentecostals. So a piece Us a seminary . Remember we all remember that the peace USA is over 90% White Euro American. A Peace USA Seminary was serving a majority student of colored population population.

00:28:17.670 - 00:28:34.590

Indeed, a majority african american student body. In a lot of ways, McCormick had really just doubled down on its mission to serve the black Church in the south and west sides of Chicago. So given

00:28:34.590 - 00:28:52.920

that context, you can understand that there was a lot of change that was going on in the institution in the organization. I offer these five principles of change. The first is this change and faithful change

00:28:52.930 - 00:29:07.150

begins with a sober assessment of your current situation confronting the brutal facts of your reality. That's jim Collins term. The brutal facts of your reality chris minds are the CFO AT ATS brought in has brought in

00:29:07.150 - 00:29:25.070

and done many presentations on missions and finances, to uh, to theological schools all over the country. I remember I invited him to give a presentation at McCormick and the conclusion was very clear. We could

00:29:25.070 - 00:29:41.720

not grow our way out of this situation through enrollment . We wouldn't raise our way out of it. Beware of the myth of that one angel investor that is out there and we couldn't cut our way out

00:29:41.730 - 00:30:00.210

to a better picture. It was going to require a coordinated and disciplined approach on many fronts so that this is a disciplined approach included things like not growing our spending and reducing our liabilities or debts and making

00:30:00.210 - 00:30:22.150

hard decisions to accomplish these things and expanding. Growing and cultivating was fatigue, donor base in recruiting locally and intentionally in the rich and theologically diverse churches in Chicago's west and south sides in keeping the more transformative

00:30:22.150 - 00:30:37.960

change possibilities in front of us. What I mean by these are institutional organizational partnerships. What sometimes included selling the property and thinking hard about what these changes in broad partnerships would mean for the mission of our

00:30:37.960 - 00:31:02.010

school going forward. So the first principle is just that getting a grasp on thinking hard about and intentionally on your current situation and the facts of your reality . The second principle, again from Collins's book,

00:31:02.010 - 00:31:18.650

Good to great who first then what get the right people on board doing the right and the right place is doing the right things. We benefited in this change process from a very strong administrative team, from

00:31:18.650 - 00:31:33.380

recruiting faculty that mirrored the student bodies diversity while not also growing the faculty. That's the cost end of its and recruiting in the process. A new generation of faculty for the institution, recruiting a strong board

00:31:33.380 - 00:31:48.420

membership, worked very closely with the executive committee and the chair of the nominating committee to recruit the talent resources that the institution needed. Getting the right people doing the right place is doing the right things can

00:31:48.420 - 00:32:09.210

help drive the momentum of change and make it seem a little more natural within the institution. Third principle , as I've said in another place, often change starts on the margins. This one was actually a

00:32:09.210 - 00:32:22.700

more difficult one to learn because as institutional people, we kind of tend to think from the center out . But Garry Oak, a hero in his book margins and mainstream, has argued that american history demonstrates

00:32:22.830 - 00:32:37.410

that our country's core values emerged most strongly not from the center, but from the margins. Hence the title of his book margins and mainstreams, for example , the civil rights movement, one could argue that

00:32:37.410 - 00:32:52.370

civil rights should be at the core of who we are as american people. The civil rights movement did not begin first as a legislative act in Congress, but it began among grassroots organizations and among churches of

00:32:52.370 - 00:33:13.120

people of color. Similarly, the inertia for an organizational change does not start sometimes from the core, but often emerges from the margins or periphery of the institution. Christiansen, who I mentioned earlier, has

00:33:13.120 - 00:33:29.170

described how disruptive innovation begins with a product or service that is downmarket of an industry that becomes because of its lower cost, more efficient production or specific market focus dramatically takes over the industry. His example was

00:33:29.170 - 00:33:43.860

to use the example of intel and how by creating first to chip and then a motherboard began to overtake the computer industry. The major movers within these industries tend to overlook these trends because initially they do not

00:33:43.860 - 00:33:58.580

perceive them to be worth the time or investment. They're on the margins, their peripheral, they're down markets. In both of these examples, historical and economic change takes root from the periphery and moves inward

00:33:58.590 - 00:34:13.540

or migrates from the bottom up when I served as a president and one at McCormick, the creative energy for most of our new programs were generated through his synergy between the schools, racial ethnic centres, which

00:34:13.540 - 00:34:30.060

did significant outreach and congregations of color and key members of the faculty, the creative process started outward and moved inward. Traditionally in most of higher education, new programs begin at the core with the faculty and

00:34:30.060 - 00:34:55.260

the curriculum and then get marketed outward. Change often reverses that trend. Mhm. Fourth principle change is difficult and it is difficult for everyone now. They don't they don't pay lectures to say something simple like

00:34:55.260 - 00:35:12.890

that. Change is difficult. But what I mean by this so know this that if you're leading change and if you're in the process of working an institution or supporting an institution that's undergoing change, that you

00:35:12.890 - 00:35:24.000

will be spending a lot of time listening to the whole system and how it is trying to adjust to these changes. What you will find is there a good faithful people who care deeply about the mission of

00:35:24.000 - 00:35:37.070

the institution and we'll see the changes as relevant in time. But that time is a loss or that change can often be perceived as a loss. And so you have to listen, you have to give

00:35:37.070 - 00:35:53.680

time for people to grieve. You have to give people time to accept the anxiety of change. It is important to do this, to maintain and build trust in the system and it is not easy and

00:35:53.680 - 00:36:17.220

it is probably in hindsight the biggest tax that was on my time and emotional energy as a president. So take the time plan for the taxing of your energy, both emotionally, spiritually and intellectually because change

00:36:17.220 - 00:36:40.920

is difficult. My final principle, which also leads me into my conclusion, we're in this together. I have grown fond of being uh at the as the executive director of A. T. S.

00:36:40.930 - 00:36:52.170

Of saying to all the organizations and schools that I've been visiting, I am not A. T. S. Our staff is not A. T. S. All of you who have participated in A

00:36:52.170 - 00:37:12.610

. T. S. Schools. You are 80 S. We are a member organization, we are adults and we're in this change together. There are three implications of this idea of being together. A

00:37:12.610 - 00:37:24.680

lot of leadership focused. The first indication a lot of leadership focused leadership literature focuses on the individual leader and what he or she can do or be. The reality is that both the fields and seeds of

00:37:24.680 - 00:37:43.390

change often preceded your leadership, paul planted, paulus watered, but God gave the growth. There are changes change agents around you and in many cases, you are simply the catalyst for that change. That

00:37:43.390 - 00:38:02.000

change that has already been cultivated, harnessing the energy , energy and direction of those change agents. What Qatar calls forming a powerful guiding coalition is critically important to building lasting change. I benefited from the creation

00:38:02.010 - 00:38:17.150

of a group of forward thinking presidents when I was a president, colleagues who are willing to be peers with me and not view each other as competition. What we shared was a common commitment to not be

00:38:17.150 - 00:38:29.950

satisfied with the status quo of theological education. And I encourage you, and this is the second implication . I encourage you to learn from others and churches and organizations where there are bright spots, places where

00:38:29.960 - 00:38:44.740

things seem to be working and use your collective wisdom and insights to inform each other's work, create a learning hive among your peers and among your colleagues, a place where you can throw new new ideas out

00:38:44.750 - 00:39:01.360

without risk of judgment from your governing boards or from your session. And then as you grow this learning hive increase it in largest group to include others outside of theological education in the church. Because changes affecting

00:39:01.360 - 00:39:20.010

all sectors of our life does much to be learned from our neighbors inside and outside of the church. 3rd principle, we are not alone, friends, scripture says to us. We are surrounded by a

00:39:20.010 - 00:39:42.980

great cloud of witnesses who are present among us now who preceded our own work and who will come after us, lean into those witnesses. Okay, how could I not conclude with reform? Thought of what

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God is doing in all this? Most importantly, we are not alone because God is with us, Jesus Great Commission. I am with you always until the concludes his great commission with I am with you

00:40:00.440 - 00:40:15.160

always until the end of the age, Matthew 28 , Jesus addresses disciples in a time of great transition , Jesus is ascension, that's a big transition in a period when they will lead the next chapter of

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God's mission to the world. But note that Jesus does not address only their mission imperative, not just their vision for what he wants from their future, but their existential fear of being on their own.

00:40:30.010 - 00:40:49.110

I will be with you until the end of the age. God knows this is lonely work. God knows our greatest fear is that we're all by ourselves . God reassures us that God is with us or

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as moses declares at the end of his life based in God's covenant, that God goes with you wherever you go and will not leave you or forsake you again, a pivotal moment of transition, both in

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the canon and in the life of Israel. The death of moses moses addresses the people of God in the wake of his transition by reminding the Children of Israel that God will be with them in the next

00:41:13.200 - 00:41:27.570

stage of their journey. God, in times of great change and transition not only gives a clear vision of how the mission of God will go forward, but provides clear assurance of God's abiding presence with us

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. God assures us that we are not know. Indeed, we will never be alone. For God's name is Emmanuel God with us. When times are changing, God is there in the middle of transition

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, God is there when we are paralyzed with uncertainty . God is here with us when the world seems to be changing and not for the better. God is there too? I close with a reading of

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Psalm 46 maybe. Our prayer in this time to change scripture speaks friends. For God is our refuge and strength, a very present present help in trouble . Therefore, we will not fear though the earth

00:42:17.980 - 00:42:32.160

should change though the mountains shake in the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, the mountains tremble, tremble with its two molds. There is a river whose streams make lad. The

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city of God, the holy habitation of the most high God. God is in the midst of the city. It shall not be moved. God will help it. When the morning dawns, the nations

00:42:50.180 - 00:43:06.040

are in an uproar. The kingdom totters! He utters his voice. The earth melts. The Lord of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob is our refuge. Come. Behold the works of

00:43:06.040 - 00:43:14.150

the Lord, See what desolation is. God has brought on the earth. He makes wars cease to the end of the earth. He breaks the bow , he shatters his spirit. He burns the shield

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with fire. Be still and know that I am God. I am exalted among the nations. I am exalted in the earth friends. The Lord of hosts is with us. The God of Jacob is

00:43:37.920 - 00:44:08.370

our refuge and then yeah. Mhm. Yeah. Mhm. We might have time for one question and I couldn't help every time I hear anyone talk about change. I think about a greeting card I saw

00:44:08.370 - 00:44:19.340

years ago that I wish I had bought because I've shared this so many times. But the outside of it has to people walking up to the door and at the bottom says Change is good. You open

00:44:19.340 - 00:44:36.350

it up, one is holding the door open for the other, but you go first. Mhm. Thank you for your thoughts. Dr martin about the future and about change. Um as you know,

00:44:36.360 - 00:44:53.920

um theological schools that are accredited need to follow certain standards and expectations. Could you talk about how in the future there redeveloped standards of the association might be written in such ways that uh less change, that

00:44:53.920 - 00:45:07.580

blessed change? Okay, so how can the standards be written in a way that blesses change? Uh Well, for those of you who don't know this , actually, the Board of Commissioners, which is

00:45:07.590 - 00:45:17.320

, there are two boards at 80 s, the board of Directors of the Association of Theological Schools. The Board of Commissioners for the Commission on Accrediting. The Board of Commissioners will be meeting tomorrow. Actually

00:45:17.330 - 00:45:35.100

, that's why I'm flying back to Pittsburgh uh to entertain a possible motion to go before the biennial meeting , the membership to redevelop the standards, to do a full redevelopment of the standards. So, to

00:45:35.100 - 00:45:45.220

answer the question, uh and this is it's far from, uh I mean, the process really hasn't even begun yet, but a lot of work has already gone into this process. What we hear is

00:45:45.220 - 00:46:00.570

that we need to figure out a way to balance both the standards which the excellence which the standards embodied and the flexibility that's needed for change. So, uh, one of the 11 piece of momentum that

00:46:00.570 - 00:46:12.900

has developed among the member schools is the idea of perhaps what we might be better served by, instead of a really long list of standards, which we currently have a very long list of standards, um

00:46:13.480 - 00:46:29.330

and but instead moving to more, some good, solid educational principles about what good theological education looks like , that could be interpreted in various different kinds of ways within schools and in their practices. So that

00:46:29.330 - 00:46:37.460

that's just a kind of a shorthand of, I think, what, what might be on the horizon . But it's, we're just beginning this process. And so, um, I don't want to foreclose

00:46:37.460 - 00:46:53.310

anything within that process before we get to it. But the idea of both maintaining the value of what the standards provide in terms of guidance, in terms of how to help a school improve and the flexibility

00:46:53.310 - 00:46:58.260

of the school needs. Two embrace the changes that