Woodbridge / Gustafson / Manetsch Great Is Thy Faithfulness

The Trinity Story
1. Auflage 2022
ISBN: 978-1-68359-666-0
Verlag: Lexham Press
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 296 Seiten

From basement Bible study to leading evangelical institution Starting from humble beginnings in the late nineteenth century, the story of Trinity International University and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School is one of faithfulness. In Great Is Thy Faithfulness, scholars John D. Woodbridge, David M. Gustafson, Scott M. Manetsch, and Bradley J. Gundlach trace the journey of Trinity International University and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. In order to tell the story of evangelicalism in America, one must know the story of Trinity International University. Great Is Thy Faithfulness is an essential resource for understanding an institution that has been at the center of evangelical theological life for decades. Readers will be encouraged by God's faithfulness to his people.

John D. Woodbridge is research professor of church history and the history of Christian thought at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He has been on the faculty since 1970. David M. Gustafson is chair of the mission and evangelism department and associate professor of evangelism and missional ministry at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He has been on the faculty since 2012. Scott M. Manetsch is chair of the church history and history of Christian thought department at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He has been on the faculty since 2000. Bradley J. Gundlach is distinguished professor of history and chair of the department of history at Trinity International University. He has been on the faculty since 1999.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Woodbridge, John D.

Gustafson, David M.

Manetsch, Scott M.

Gundlach, Bradley J.

Leseproben

Foreword

God’s faithfulness has shaped the life and work of the institution now called Trinity International University since its founding in the nineteenth century. This wonderful place has been used of God to prepare generation after generation of men and women who have served the Lord in the marketplace, in government, in healthcare, in education, and in the legal community, among so many other spheres in this country and around the world. Primarily, however, the influence of Trinity through the years has been in service to churches, parachurch organizations, colleges and seminaries, mission agencies, and other nonprofits.

THE TRINITY HERITAGE

Trinity’s heritage can be traced back more than twelve decades to 1897, when a Swedish Evangelical Free Church hosted a ten-week Bible course in the basement of a Chicago church. This class developed into the Swedish Bible Institute of Chicago. Joining together with the Norwegian-Danish Bible Institute and the Evangelical Free Church Bible Institute and Seminary, the unified merger of these Scandinavian schools became known as the Trinity Seminary and Bible College. In the early 1960s, the institution moved to its current location and was renamed Trinity College and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. President Wilbert Norton and Dean Kenneth Kantzer were instrumental in leading these efforts to envision a new day for all programs at Trinity. These two administrators typify the many faithful leaders who have served at Trinity over the decades.

In the 1990s, the institution was once again renamed and reorganized through the combined administrations of Ken Meyer and Greg Waybright. The little Scandinavian Bible College was transformed a century after its founding into a complex and comprehensive learning community consisting of Trinity College, Trinity Graduate School, Trinity Law School, and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, with a campus in Deerfield, Illinois, as well as south Florida and southern California. The Carl Henry Center for Theological Understanding, the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity, the Center for Transformational Churches, the Hiebert Center for World Christianity and Global Theology, and the Law School’s Center for Human Rights now flourish as major aspects of this work. For more than 120 years, Trinity has educated women and men to think, live, and serve in a manner consistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ. These alums have joined with faculty and staff through the years to provide leadership and guidance for Trinity to become an influencer of North American and global evangelicalism.

Shaped by a shared mission and core values, Trinity has prioritized graduate theological education with a focus on serving both the church and academy. Dean Kantzer’s vision for theological education has attracted some of the finest evangelical scholars in the world to the Trinity faculty. Together they have advanced the shared work of teaching, research, and scholarship in ways characterized by the highest academic standards combined with evangelical faithfulness. The listing of faculty members who have served at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School through the decades reads like a “who’s who” in the evangelical world.

Since the days of President Wilbert Norton in the middle of the twentieth century, Trinity has also been committed to liberal arts-based undergraduate programs, which are enhanced by professional and graduate programs with a focus on serving society and engaging culture. The global reputation of this dynamic academic community can be attributed to the quality faculty, staff, and students who have served and studied at Trinity. Through the years, those serving at Trinity have been able to draw from this heritage as a source of hope to face the future. Details of this heritage are carefully portrayed in this well-written volume, coauthored by John Woodbridge, David Gustafson, Scott Manetsch, Bradley Gundlach, and D. A. Carson. The oversight for the project provided by Woodbridge is certainly worthy of commendation.

ACADEMIC QUALITY AND CONFESSIONAL COMMITMENTS

For more than 120 years the men and women associated with Trinity have been characterized as “a people of the Book,” viewing holy Scripture as a special form of God’s revelation, a unique mode of divine disclosure. The confession of the total truthfulness or infallibility of the verbally inspired Bible has been an important safeguard, a necessary commitment for the Trinity community to remain tethered to a faithful Christian orthodoxy. The doctrine of scriptural authority, a commitment to the good news of the gospel, leadership in global missions, pace-setting efforts in the area of serious evangelical scholarship, and the undergirding emphasis on cooperative collaboration with other believers who proclaim “one faith, one hope, one Lord” have been hallmarks of the best of Trinity’s heritage through the years. The Trinity motto, “Entrusted with the gospel,” reflects the mindset of those who have served as board members and administrators as well as members of the faculty and staff.

In God’s providence, Trinity has served as a strategic leader in these areas for the larger evangelical community. Helping to foster Christian unity across denominational lines has also been a distinctive feature of the Trinity community. This emphasis on unity has always been combined with a dedication to biblical orthodoxy, a historical Christianity shaped by the pattern of Christian truth, a faithful intercultural, multigenerational, multiethnic, and transcontinental evangelicalism that stands or falls on first-order issues.

Even as some other institutions have lost their theological compass during the twelve decades of Trinity’s history, Trinity, by God’s grace, has remained faithful to the pattern of Christian truth concerning the truthfulness of God’s written word, the holy Trinity, the deity and humanity of Jesus Christ, the uniqueness of the gospel message, the enabling work of God’s Spirit, salvation by grace alone through faith alone, the importance of the church and the people of God who are both gathered and scattered, the hope of Christ’s return, the sacredness of life and family, and a concern for the least, the last, and the lost. This commitment to confessional integrity is in accord with the Nicene affirmations that the church is “one, holy, catholic, and apostolic.”

Committed to academic excellence, Christian faithfulness, and lifelong learning, those who have been a part of Trinity International University through the years have taken seriously the calling that is theirs. Entrusted with the gospel of Jesus Christ, serving together to advance a distinctive mission through grace-filled relationships, called to serve the global church through the development of servant and shepherd leaders, these men and women have shared a kingdom-focused vision for the renewal of church and culture. Those who have been called to serve at Trinity through the years have recognized the special responsibility that has been theirs to ensure that this institution remains mission-faithful, a responsibility that increases in importance with each passing year.

As previously noted, Trinity now includes an undergraduate college and a graduate school, a law school and a divinity school, with campuses in Illinois, Florida, and California. The reality, however, is that the institution has been put together through the years without an apparent overarching design. This has made missional, academic, and fiscal challenges quite real.

The authors of this fine institutional history relate Trinity’s story of God’s remarkable faithfulness to the school through both good and trying days. They do so in an engaging way in the pages that follow. With the Lord’s help Trinity survived both hard financial bumps and educational and theological challenges along the way. The school’s doors almost closed on several occasions. In God’s good providence, a few last minute rescues saved the school. Trinity also kept in a healthy balance disparate influences such as Scandinavian pietism, American revivalism, evangelical confessionalism, social activism, and global theological trajectories, in addition to the push and pull from very real regional and programmatic differences.

Trinity International University has earned a reputation for its dedication to serious academic scholarship formed by its commitments to the truthfulness of holy Scripture and the transformational power of the gospel message. Recognizing their place as heirs of the sixteenth-century Reformation, pietism, and Puritanism, as well as the Awakenings, the men and women of Trinity have been shaped by the great historic Christian confessions and the larger evangelical tradition.

As noted, Trinity has characteristically been a place in which the great variety of this evangelical tradition can be celebrated. While this is certainly true, those who have served at Trinity have also recognized that there is not unlimited variety without boundaries or without a convictional core. In fact, the Trinity community has embraced an understanding of the clearly articulated confessional commitments that have been affirmed and adopted through the years.

A hallmark at Trinity through the years has been an unflinching belief in the full inspiration and truthfulness of Scripture together with the great affirmations of the early church regarding the Trinity and Christology. Unlike so many other institutions, Trinity has, in God’s kind providence, been able to avoid swinging the pendulum too far in reaction to errors on the left or on the right, thus rejecting a fundamentalist reductionism on the...