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November 1997
Back Issues
Contents
Emmanuel
Announces Heritage of Excellence
Emmanuel School of Religion is excited to announce a five-year
capital campaign entitled Heritage of Excellence. Funds
raised will build “The Emmanuel Village,” a student housing complex,
expand the Library facilities, and provide funds for scholarships and
staff positions.
Plans call for site preparation to begin on the Emmanuel Village by
October 1998.
Click on
the image to see a bigger diagram.
This $3.275 million campaign was officially launched at the October
21 dinner attended by the Board of Trustees, Board of Associates,
seminary personnel, and local friends of the school. That evening Dr. C.
Robert Wetzel, President of Emmanuel, announced that certain individuals
had already expressed their intention of providing $800,000 toward the
goal. Since then, that total has risen to $1,020,000 — nearly 1/3
of the goal.
Although there were many highlights, the expressions on the faces of
Fred and Dorothy Thompson as President Wetzel told the gathering that
the community center — the “heart” of The Emmanuel Village —
would be named in their honor, truly made the evening an event to
remember. Dr. Thompson was Emmanuel’s second president, serving in
that capacity from 1969–1984. In addition to the community center, the
first phase of the Village will include cottages for student housing, a
child care facility, and a recreation area.
Another dear friend of Emmanuel to be honored through this campaign
is Dr. Beauford H. Bryant. Recently deceased, Dr. Bryant was always a
voice for the need of an excellent library. The Heritage of Excellence
campaign will provide for the completion of the unfinished third floor
of the Library to be named in memory of Dr. Bryant. The third floor will
provide for additional shelf space and be the “home” of the library
study carrels. Additionally, the first and second floors of the library
will be refurbished.
Within the next year, all friends of Emmanuel will be invited to
participate in Heritage of Excellence. The campaign is organized so that
various segments of the Emmanuel constituency will work to achieve group
goals which when added together will achieve the total campaign goal.
Currently campaigns among the Board of Trustees, Board of Associates,
and school personnel are taking place. This will be followed by
campaigns among the alumni, students, churches, and individual friends
of Emmanuel.
Through the Envoy and special mailings we will keep you posted
concerning the progress of the campaign, and ask that you pray for the
campaign in general and personally participate when contacted.
Truly this is an exciting time for Emmanuel. The success of Heritage
of Excellence will be another milestone reached since Emmanuel’s
founding in 1961. While new facilities, scholarships and staff are the
physical goals for which we strive, we remain true to the belief that
quality graduate-school education for Christian leaders is the purpose
behind all that we do now and in the future.
 From
the President
Where is Your Name?
On the Sunday of the National Missionary Convention I had the
opportunity to preach for the Sunnybrook Christian Church in Stillwater,
Oklahoma. The persistent rain did not dampen the spirits of the thousand
or so people who attended that morning. The fact that Oklahoma State
University had won its homecoming game the night before may have had
something to do with the exuberant spirit that prevailed. But obviously
it was much deeper than that. This congregation has enjoyed remarkable
growth in recent years under the ministry of Tom Moll. He and Kay are
very much at home in this university community.
Visiting the Stillwater area proved to be a nostalgic trip for Bonnie
and me. Nearby Ripley was the sight of our first ministry during our
student days at Midwest Christian College. That was forty-four years
ago. On Saturday we met with some friends who had been in our youth
group, all of whom are now grandparents!
Most of the people we knew in the Ripley Church are now with the
Lord. We had brought with us the friendship quilt the ladies had made
for us, each square of which contained the name of a family. We
struggled to put the names with the memory of faces. I thought of the
old hymn we used to sing on Sunday evenings:
Is my name written there
On the page white and fair?
In the Book of Thy Kingdom
Is my name written there?
On the same trip we visited our home town, Hugoton, Kansas. My Dad
and I went out to the cemetery. After visiting the family graves we
drove around the cemetery recalling the people who were buried there. It
dawned on me that I knew far more people in the Hugoton cemetery than I
now know in the town.
If the Lord tarries I suppose that just about all of us will have our
names on tombstones sooner or later. But there is something to be said
for having one’s name on something other than a tombstone! I think of
the memorials that list the names of those who died for our country.
Their names on a memorial say something about their commitment and
service.
We at Emmanuel School of Religion want to remember those who make
this ministry possible through their stewardship. Furthermore their
names associated with Emmanuel serve as an endorsement of the School.
Hence we have endowed scholarships which bear the names of donors or
their relatives or friends. The Emmanuel building bears the name of a
man whose remarkable business enterprise and Christian stewardship have
been an enormous blessing to the churches of the Restoration Movement.
Walker Drive is named after our founding president. These acts of naming
enable future generations to share with appreciation in the Emmanuel
tradition.
A few years ago a Christian lady in California left a significant
bequest to Emmanuel School of Religion. It was a special blessing in
that her gift enabled us to finish the fiscal year in the black. But
since the gift had not been designated for a named scholarship or
project, we were concerned that the memory of this dear lady would be
lost. It was out of this concern that our Executive Director of
Development, Dan Lawson, conceived the idea of the Wall of Honor. The
Wall of Honor will contain the names of individuals, churches and
corporations who have made substantial gifts to the School, either in a
single contribution or collectively over a period of years.
On Thursday, October 24, 1997, the Wall of Honor was unveiled at a
chapel service attended by trustees, associates and the campus
community. It has now been mounted on a wall near the Mildred Welshimer
Phillips Chapel door.
We will all have our names on a tombstone some day. Through the grace
of God we already have our names in the Lamb’s Book of Life. But there
is something to be said for having one’s name on a ministry as a
testimony for what we regard as important in our life time.
—Dr. C. Robert Wetzel, President
Student
Ministers to Youth in Muslim Country
by Joel
Carillet, second-year student
The warm months of summer have always been an anticipated break from
school and an opportunity to do something new. This summer was no
exception as I worked as a youth minister with an interdenominational
church in the Middle East. The bulk of the youth were North Americans
back in the Middle East for the summer, having returned from boarding
school to visit their working parents. In many ways my experience
differed little from youth ministry in the States. We had Bible studies,
played wild games of laser tag, organized a community service project,
and more. Having had only a little experience with youth, I stepped into
my new role with some fear and trembling. But by the end of the summer I
was surprised at how attached I had become to these young people. This
was not just a “summer ministry” but the interconnecting of lives
that I will carry with me always.
While I enjoyed this experience, it still had its tensions. I was
ministering in an ardently Muslim country where the church was illegal.
Most Christians faced persecution, even death, for following Christ. The
church I was a part of was unique in that we were allowed to meet as
long as we remained discreet about it. (For this reason it is best that
the name of the country not be printed.) One of my responsibilities,
then, was to ensure that Muslim friends of the Christian youth did not
join us for any overtly Christian activities since this could seriously
disturb the status-quo.
I am thankful for the opportunity I had to see another part of Christ’s
Church and to experience something besides the wide freedom that we
enjoy and often take for granted in the States. Pray for those who do
not possess this freedom, that they will find ways to share the Gospel
despite the obstacles.
David
M. Thompson Receives Distinguished Service Award
 David
M. Thompson of Indian Head Park, Ill., was presented the Emmanuel School
of Religion Distinguished Service Award at the recent Board of Trustees
banquet held at the school.
The ministry of Emmanuel has consistently been the recipient of the
stewardship of David and Oralee Thompson. In presenting the award,
Emmanuel President C. Robert Wetzel said, “David Thompson represents
the kind of Christian responsibility that enables specialized ministries
like Emmanuel School of Religion to fulfill their stewardship before
God. Recognizing David is our way as a seminary to highlight what we
have been teaching our students, i.e. that all gifts are from God and
hence carry with them the responsibility of stewardship. Furthermore by
recognizing David we are acknowledging our dependence upon God’s
people who make it possible for us to exercise our gifts.”
David is president of the investment firm Griffin, Kubik, Stephens
and Thompson in Chicago, and is the son of Fred and Dorothy Thompson of
Johnson City, Tenn.
President’s
Office and Dean’s Office Staff
Front row, l to r: Dr. Bruce E. Shields,
Director of Doctor of Ministry Program; Dr. Eleanor A. Daniel,
Dean; Dr. Calvin L. Phillips, Chancellor; Dr.
C. Robert Wetzel, President. Back row, l to r: Mary
Ann Jobe, Administrative Assistant to the Dean; Shirley
Marshall, Administrative Assistant to the President; Melissa
Ford, Secretary for Academic Services.
Shields’
Sabbatical Research Focuses on Cross-Cultural Preaching
On sabbatical leave for the calendar year of 1997 is Dr. Bruce E.
Shields, Director of the Doctor of Ministry Program and Professor of
Preaching and Biblical Hermeneutics. As part of his sabbatical leave
plans, Dr. Shields took a six week trip to Austria, Malaysia, Korea, and
Japan to interview preachers and others about preaching and other forms
of communication in their local cultures.
Shields spent the two weeks in Heiligenkreuz, Austria, teaching a
course on worship at the TCM center there. His students included 18
preachers from Romania, three preachers from Moldova, and one Christian
worker from Poland.
 Dr.
Shields then visited Malaysia and Jerry Eng (MAR 1996), his family (seen
at right), and the congregation he leads. He preached there one
Sunday morning, led four evening sessions on worship, and spoke to a
ministerial association of fifteen men and one woman from various
denominations and ethnic groups.
The next weekend he traveled to Korea, where he met several leaders
of Christian churches/Churches of Christ. In Chong Ju he preached at two
different churches and had conversations with three different preachers.
Shields traveled to Kyoto, Japan, the next day, where he participated
in the meeting of Societas Homiletica, an international organization of
homileticians, where he was able to get acquainted with preachers and
professors from many different countries.
Shields’ second week in Japan was arranged by Paul Clark, President
of Osaka Bible Seminary, a college of the Christian churches/churches of
Christ. He preached at the Kamizono Church of Christ, where Nick Saitoh
(M.Div. 1968) is the minister. Saitoh also teaches preaching at the
college, where Shields presented a series of five lectures and a sermon
as the first of the college’s Founders Lectures. The next Sunday he
preached at the Ono Church of Christ in Kobe and had conversations with
faculty members and students.
Shields’ trip ended in Tokyo, where he was hosted by Dr. Katsuhiko
Kondo and his family. Kondo arranged for Shields to speak to a
homiletics class at Tokyo Union Seminary and also to preach in chapel.
Both opportunities opened conversations with both students and faculty
members about contemporary preaching.
Dr. Shields says, “My personal purpose in this trip was to learn
what I could about preaching in other cultures. I learned much more than
I expected to about the cultures, about preaching, and about Christian
worship. I was able to confirm my theory that the dominant influence on
preaching in much of the world remains the nineteenth century
Euro-American missionary. I also found, on the other hand, a number of
encouraging signs of cultural contextualization in preaching. I expect
the experience to enrich my teaching in this increasingly multi-cultural
world of ours.”
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