Gwinnett - Hall Baptist College

What makes it excellent? I can't tell much from its web site. Who are the profs? Are you a student there, or do you teach?

Thanks,
Bill

 

I live less than two miles from Gwinnett Hall Baptist church and I did not realize that they also had a school.

They have a new auditorium that isn't showing on the website.

 

read the Bible three times as a requisite for the ThD? :laugh: :laugh:

can I get a PhD too if I read it six times?:laugh:

 

I've been anticipating your jumping in.

A basic question has to be this: What makes folks think they're qualified to offer higher education degrees at all, not to mention a ThD?

If this church had a Bible institute and were offering courses leading to a Certificate in Bible or such, it would not be an issue.

Bill

 

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Hi Bill

same old stuff here huh? sigh!

 

'fraid so.

Bill

 

Yea looks like another one of them dirty rotten little church built colleges where they teach Bible,doctrine ,and how to plant build and run a local New Testament church. They mentor them little preacher boys till they know what to do and send em out to win souls and rotten work like that. Those little untrained dummies are only going to build churches that run from 100-600 on Sundays. They will just pray like everything depends on God and work like everything depends on them.
Not all of them will succeed or be diamonds in the rough ,but many will be putty in God's hands.

 

Upon what do you base that judgment, Bill? I have little idea what they do according to what is on their website.

I do know this, having spent more than a few years in such churches as a younger man. The teaching of doctrine is often simplistic, evangelism is pragmatically driven and not biblical, and the "program" of the church is driven by what grows the church numerically than by what the Scriptures teach.

My greatest contention is not that they've set up a school but that they've set up a school granting degrees that they're simply not qualified to issue. If they want to issue a Bible training diploma, well and good. A higher education degree, though, appears to be beyond their level of ability, again, by what I see according to their site. Who is the faculty? What training has the faculty had? And to offer doctorates?

Here is my fear. You have well-intentioned students who will go through this course of study and receive their diploma and will one day realize, after all the time and money, that their diploma isn't worth its paper and ink. In this day, people can do so much better.

Let me put it this way. I have a DMin (Luther Rice) and a PhD (SBTS), and I would not think of establishing a school out of my local church purporting to offer the type of substantial training leading to a bachelor's degree, much less a doctorate. A Bible training center. Perhaps. A college? No way. Whatever happened to integrity and conscience?

Bill

 

N ot a matter of judgement. I did what everybody else here did and that is jumped to a conclusion without investigating all of the facts. I did it on purpose because we always tend to jump in the negative direction with our judgements. We are to quick to point an accusatory finger.

I understand your line also on the granting of degrees from these small schools, they are born from those who came from other small schools.I think thier perspective is different. They think in terms of 4,5,and 7year degrees, BS,MS more of the same, PhD piled higher and deeper, in other words they think in terms of time and things learned instead of different levels of rigor and depth of material. To thier own reasoning they are a little more pragmatic in thier education. They certainly don't want anything from liberal non-believing colleges and seminaries and they don't want to filter through all of the calvinists in the SBC schools, let alone the regular reformed and other outright calvinist schools. What does that leave?

 

The real question would be , how do you fix this?:BangHead:

 

Bill,

These types of schools preceded the conservative resurgence in the SBC schools. Besides, only SBTS has a fairly widespread Calvinist influence.

From my experience, they are not merely "a little more pragmatic." If they are anything like Hyles-Anderson (from which I earned a master of education degree), they are pragmatic to the core.

What about Tennessee Temple? It is certainly not liberal or Calvinistic. What about Luther Rice? Again, neither legalistic or Calvinistic.

I think you're right about their perspective of piling up years for degrees. That exhibits a total unawareness of higher education.

How is this fixed? The primary reason why I even post to such threads is to seek to inform others about the problems with such places. I certainly don't want the government to get involved, but I fear that such places will one day create the excuse for the federal government to get more involved in higher education.

Bill

 

My suggestion would be for the qualified to go and teach in these schools. Help improve these programs, raise the bar from the inside. It just takes the qualified to say I'm going to go and fix that right instead of just complain about it.

 

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First, I did not "jump in." I looked at the website.
Second, I am doing what you suggest. But I'm not infinite so can only do what I have time and energy to do.
Third, if I see error, I may speak up. If that bothers you-sorry.

 

Stop offering "degrees" and start offering "certificates," for one.

 

Your point is well taken, but the problem is that the foundation is messed up. It's not simply a matter of the well qualified going to these places; it's the educational foundation there to begin with. If I wanted to go there (which is, of course, an impossibility considering that my Calvinism and non-dispensationalism would disqualify me at the outset), I would want the entire structure changed and the rigor, I suspect, would have to increased considerably.

Really, these schools have trouble paying professors a living wage (isn't there something about the laborer being worthy of his wages? [1 Tim 5:18]). The tuition they charge is typically much less than in more erstwhile schools (their pool of students would dry up if they charged more), and the teachers in these more rigorous schools are hardly getting rich. Consequently, schools such as the one being discussed here often have profs who couldn't get hired anywhere else because of their own lack of qualification.

So it's not simply an issue of qualified teachers going to what are in my opinion illegitimate schools to make them better. There really are plenty of legitimate schools already established.

Now, if the pastor of this church, who is also overseeing this school, it doubtlessly being his brainchild, were to desire to change the school to rise to a generally accepted level for an institution of higher education, such as having professors with terminal degrees and building up a library and providing a course of study which demanded some rigor, then the institution could serve the needs of the student seeking advanced education.

Bill

 

Would these schools even be willing to hire "the qualified" and would they permit them to improve their program?

 

Bill Grover, That is exactly what I admire about you. You put your money where your mouth is. I know you are a calvinist but from what I gather you teach more like Erickson i.e. all sides of an issue and let the student decide.

Without contacting the school it is impossible to know how sound or unsound it is. So the fact is we don't know. The web site is'nt much help.

I do know there is help for free education on the internet through Covenant,BTI,and Gordon-Comwell. I have listened to several hundered lectures and read many books and I think I may have learned something along the way. I never will get a degree or certificate for any of this learning. What do you think is more valuble, the learning experience or a certificate?