If you have your Bibles with you, I’d invite you to turn in them with me to 2 Timothy chapter 2. And if you would allow me to say just a few words of introduction, especially about the connection between Reformed Theological Seminary and First Presbyterian Church Jackson, because the connections are deep and long and familial and personal and significant. Tonight marks a new era in the history of Reformed Theological Seminary. We have been looking for a president for the RTS Jackson campus ever since Dr. Guy Richardson retired. And I had been filling in that role while continuing to serve the entirety of RTS as the chancellor. And in God’s kindness, He has provided to us the Reverend Dr. David T. Irving to lead Reformed Theological Seminary here in Jackson.
Now a little historical note or background about the connections between RTS and First Pres. The very first meeting of the group that became the Board of Trustees of Reformed Theological Seminary was held on January 25 of 1964. Sam Patterson, who was the head of the French Camp Academy, met with Robert Cannada, Erskine Wells, Robert Kennington – all three of whom were elders of First Presbyterian Church, right here, along with Leonard VanHorn, who was working at French Camp Academy, and Horace Hull, a ruling elder from a presbyterian church in Memphis. And they gathered in Erskine Wells’ law office and they met about starting a new seminary. On April 8 of 1964, they signed the charter that brought RTS into existence. I was asking Ric Cannada about this. I don’t know whether they did that deliberately or not, but those of you at First Pres need to know that on April 8 of 1837, the charter for First Presbyterian Church in Jackson was signed. And so I don’t know whether they deliberately chose April 8 of 1964 in order to mirror what had happened in the founding of First Presbyterian Church, but if they didn’t, it’s a very interesting providence, isn’t it?
They quickly hired their first professor, Dr. Morton H. Smith, and for about a year he was the only professor. They were teaching courses in various places in Mississippi – some at French Camp, some at Kosciusko, some in other places around Mississippi and the Deep South. But soon, the senate of Mississippi, the Presbyterian Church US Synod of Mississippi, asked them not to teach courses at French Camp because French Camp was associated with the Southern Presbyterian Church and they were viewed as a renegade seminary. And so that forced a crisis, and it was decided that they would move the seminary to Jackson. And they were enabled to buy land on a horse farm in West Jackson, the Bird property, and they obtained that property in 1965. Soon after that, they hired several other professors. Some of you will know the name of Al Freundt who taught Church History, or James DeYoung, or Jack Scott. I don’t know whether Ann Scott is here tonight, but Ann probably did the flowers. Ann’s dad, Jack Scott, was one of the original faculty of RTS. Richard Bodie was also hired to be a faculty member. In the summer of 1966, we had five faculty members and no students. Three students had indicated an interested in coming, but we had no idea how many people would show up. In fact, we had no idea whether we would exist by the time that they would graduate. It was an entire faith venture. And when the opening convocation came around in 1966 and Darby Fulton, the former executive secretary of the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions for the Southern Presbyterian Church gave the convocation message, fourteen students had gathered, and three more came later in the year, and so seventeen students finished in the first year. But we had no idea how many students would come.
The next year, another son of this congregation named O. Palmer Robertson joined the faculty and taught Old Testament. So you’re beginning to see the kinds of connections here. Our first graduate was Tim Fortner. Tim is Brister Ware’s brother-in-law, and he’s still discipling people to this day. In fact, I just saw a picture on Facebook that Anna posted of him on the phone discipling people. Our very first graduate has faithfully served the Lord all the days of his life. Now today, sixty years later, RTS offers theological education in ten U.S. cities – Jackson, Orlando, Charlotte, Washington, Atlanta, Houston, New York City, Dallas, Chicago, and Nashville, in nine U.S. states, as well as cooperating with a doctoral program at MacKenzie Presbyterian University in San Paulo, Brazil. A doctoral program, by the way that, has been facilitated by a very generous supporter of the seminary right here in Mississippi. That program exists because of presbyterians in Mississippi that wanted to help the largest presbyterian denomination in the western hemisphere embrace inerrancy, inspiration, reformed theology, and the great commission.
RTS started with fourteen students in 1966. Today, at any given time, we have over 2,000 students enrolled in masters and doctoral programs, most of whom are headed for the Church’s ministry. Today, at any given time, there will be about thirty-eight denominations represented in the student body, and these people come to us from all over the country and all over the world. At last count, we have students from about thirty-five countries in our student body. Over the years, more than 13,000 students have taken courses at Reformed Theological Seminary, and more than 6,500 have graduated and are now serving the Lord in eighty countries around the world. RTS graduates have started at least twenty-three theological schools around the world to provide reformed, Biblical, pastoral training in South America, Africa, Asia and beyond.
Now when we started out at RTS, we said we were committed to three things. The inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture, the reformed faith as set forth in the Westminster Standards, the spiritual nature and mission of the Church. Those are still our commitments today. So what are we trying to do? Well, I want to turn to inspired Scripture for the answer to that question, so let me direct your attention to 2 Timothy 2, verse 2, and before we read it, let’s pray and ask God’s help and blessing.
Heavenly Father, we do not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. The grass withers, the flowers, they fade and they fall, but Your Word stands and it stands forever. Sanctify us with truth. Your Word is truth. All Scripture is given by inspiration and profitable for teaching, reproof, correction, training in righteousness, that we may be equipped for every good work. So speak Lord, Your servants listen. We ask this in Jesus’ name, amen.
This is the Word of God, hear it in 2 Timothy chapter 2 verse 2. Paul, writing to Timothy:
“The things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.”
Amen, and thus ends this reading of God’s holy, inspired, and inerrant Word. May He write its eternal truth upon all our hearts.
Now in this passage, the apostle Paul is saying to Timothy that he wants him to entrust the truth of the Gospel, which he has heard from Paul, that he wants him to entrust the whole counsel of God, which Paul has proclaimed to him, to other faithful and able teachers. That’s the core of what this verse says. In other words, the apostle Paul is telling Timothy that the future ministry of the Church will not just happen. It will not just appear. It will not just exist by itself. It actually has to be cultivated. And so he says to Timothy, “Timothy, your job is not only to proclaim the Gospel” – you remember what he says in 2 Timothy 4:2, “Preach the Word.” That’s part of Timothy’s job. Or he’ll say to Timothy, “Give a special attention to the reading of Scripture in public and the teaching of the Word.” But it is also Timothy’s charge to entrust that Word, to entrust that truth which he has received from Paul in other faithful men who will give it to other faithful men. So what we see here is the importance that Paul places on cultivating disciples – able men of character who are apt to teach.
Now according to Jesus, how do you make a disciple? Matthew 28:18-20 gives you His answer. You baptize and teach them. You “baptize them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit” – so they understand that their salvation is in God alone. He is their only hope and He is their Lord and Savior. And then you teach them. What do you teach them? Jesus says, “Teach them not only to learn but to obey all that I have commanded you.” And what did Jesus teach them in His earthly ministry? He taught them of Himself from all of the Scriptures. So you make a disciple by teaching them all of the commands of Christ and all of His teaching from all of the Scriptures. And so the ministry of the Church needs to know and live according to Jesus’ teaching and needs to be able to teach others to know and live according to Jesus’ teaching. And so in this passage, the apostle Paul, who knows that he is not long for this world, in a matter of months, maybe weeks after he writes this letter he will be martyred, and so he is thinking about Timothy in a world with no apostles. And he says, “Timothy, part of your job is entrusting the things that I have taught you into other faithful and able men’s hands and hearts and lives and then having them entrust it to other faithful men.”
Alfred Plummer, the great Anglican commentator on the pastoral epistles in the 19th century, says, “This is the earliest trace of the formation of a theological school in the New Testament.” I think he’s right. And he goes on to say, “It is a school which has for its object not merely the instruction of the ignorant but the protection and maintenance of a definite body of doctrine.”
And I want you to see the four steps that are involved in just this one verse. The first step is from Christ to Paul. What Paul had passed onto Timothy did not come from Paul. It came from God. Specifically, it came to Paul from Christ. You will remember in 1 Corinthians chapter 11 verse 23 when Paul is about to give us instructions about the observation of The Lord’s Supper, he says, “For I received from the Lord” – that is, the Lord Jesus Christ – “what I also delivered to you.” In other words, Paul is saying, “I didn’t make this up. I got this from Jesus and I’m passing it on to you.” And he’ll say in Galatians chapter 1, verses 11 and 12, “The Gospel that was preached by me is not a man’s gospel, for I did not receive it from any man nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.” So Paul wants to stress, “My teaching does not come from me. It comes from God. It comes from Christ.” And so he will congratulate the Thessalonian Christians in 1 Thessalonians chapter 2 verse 13 with these words – “We thank God constantly for this, that when you receive the Word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but for what it really is, the Word of God.” So Paul is conscious that the body of teaching that he has passed onto Timothy does not come from him. It comes from Christ. So from Christ to Paul, Paul is the direct recipient of divine, special revelation from Christ.
And then here’s the second step from Paul to Timothy – as an apostle, as an ambassador of Christ, he passes on that which he received from Christ to Timothy. Listen to what he says, verse 2, “The things which you heard from me in the presence of many witnesses.” So Paul entrusts those things to Timothy. So Timothy has the confidence, “Not only has my mentor, Paul, who loves me like a father taught me these things, he was taught by my Savior who bled and died for my life. So the things that have been entrusted to me ultimately come from Jesus. And it’s my job to make sure that the voice of Jesus continues to be heard in the Church.” So there’s the second step. First, from Christ to Paul, then from Paul to Timothy.
Then third, from Timothy to faithful men able to teach. “Entrust these” – look again at 2 Timothy 2:2 – “Entrust these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.” So now, Timothy must also just as Paul identified Timothy, so Timothy must identify and pass it on to faithful men. So part of Timothy’s job as a pastor, and of course he doesn’t do this alone – How was Timothy ordained into the ministry? By the presbytery. By the laying on of hands. And so a group of elders said, “Timothy, we are setting you apart for the Gospel ministry.” So Timothy is not doing this on his own, but he is doing it along with other faithful elders. So they are on the lookout for other faithful men who can minister to God’s people, and Timothy must identify and pass on what he has learned from Paul to them.
So here is another step. Don’t miss the end of verse 2. Here’s the fourth step. From Christ to Paul, step one. From Paul to Timothy, step two. From Timothy to faithful men, step three. And then step four – “who will be able to teach others also.” In other words, Timothy is not only to look out for faithful men, able men now; he is to look beyond them to the next generation. Those faithful men that he identifies and passes on the truth to, must pass it on to others. And that means that every Gospel minister has to be thinking about preparing at least two generations of ministry – the current and the next. In other words, we can’t just preach to our congregation and say, “I’m not worried about what’s going to happen to their children and grandchildren. We need to preach to our congregation and be preparing the people who are going to pastor them, their children and their grandchildren when we are gone. All of us have that obligation. And that is what seminary was invented – and I might say, mostly by presbyterians! That is what seminary was invented to do. That’s what the founders of the Princeton Theological Seminary in 1812 intended to do – prepare the next generation of Gospel ministry to hold fast to the Word of God, to proclaim the whole counsel of God, to preach the Gospel of our Lord Jeuss Christ, to preach and to teach all that the Scripture proclaims.
That’s what we are aiming to do at Reformed Theological Seminary. That’s what we are trying to do. And it will be David Irving’s trust and stewardship to oversee the souls and the preparation of all who pass through the halls of Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson. I’m entrusting my own son to him. That’s how much I trust David. And young people in the room tonight, most of your pastors and most of your interns have studied at Reformed Theological Seminary, so we are thinking about who is going to minister to you now and when you grow up. And grandparents in the room, we are trying to prepare the ministers that are going to serve the souls of your children and your grandchildren. We are thinking about that now. That is what we are here trying to do. The mission of Reformed Theological Seminary is to serve the Church by preparing its ministry through a program of graduate theological education based upon the authority of the inerrant Word of God and committed to the reformed faith as expressed in the Westminster Standards that aims to cultivate in that future ministry a mind for truth and a heart for God.
So how do we do that? How do we do what Paul tells us to do here? Well first, we gather and prepare a cohort of those called by the Church for Gospel ministry. There are a lot – all you have to do is turn on the internet in any phase or format and you’ll find all sorts of self-appointed people telling you what they think about religion and what they think about God. And some of it is complete idiocy if not heresy. The ministers that we are trying to prepare did not call themselves. They were called by God through the Church. And we gather them together in a cohort to prepare them for the Gospel ministry to the Church. And under experienced, gifted, godly, orthodox, pastor-theologians who know them and love them and teach them and mentor them and model the Christian life in ministry to them, we aim to help them grow by God’s grace together in faith, hope and love and to come to a greater and deeper knowledge and conviction of the whole counsel of God and so be enabled to handle accurately and proclaim faithfully the Word of God, to pray continuously, Scripturally and earnestly, to minister the sacraments, the covenant signs and seals of God’s promises rightly, to shepherd faithfully, wisely and lovingly, and who correspondingly have their own lives filled with and their faith matured by that same grace and truth so that their character and life and ministry and witness are shaped by God’s lavish, gracious, loving, saving work on their behalf in Christ and by His Word.
That’s what Paul did for Timothy, right? You know, Timothy would have had no doubt what the grace of God meant to the apostle Paul. Paul was the one who said that “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, and I am the chief of them.” You see what Paul is saying to you tonight? “If I can be saved, if I can be saved, any of you can be saved because I was the chief of sinners.” Timothy had no doubts about the grace of God, and Paul has those glorious statements of the grace of God. “He who spared not His own Son but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him freely give us all things?” “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly.” Timothy had heard that, and we want to do the same thing. We want to do the same thing with our students. And the aim of this approach to theological education is to produce and to prepare shepherd-teachers for the Church who have a mind for truth and a heart for God and who will live a life for ministry – humble, happy, faithful, brave, loving, pastoral, sturdy, gentle, godly ministers who understand, teach and embody reformed piety, doctrine, worship, polity and practice. We want to provide God’s people with ministers who know and believe their Bible, who trust in and treasure God, who bear witness to Christ and proclaim His Gospel, who are themselves transformed by God’s grace and truth, who love their people and who live to serve them and who have a passion for the great commission and for the spreading of the fame of the name of Jesus that every knee should bow and every tongue confess Him as Lord and Savior.
And the trustees of Reformed Theological Seminary have given that stewardship into the hands of David Irving. Won’t you pray for him? Won’t you encourage him as he carries that responsibility before the Lord? To fulfill the exhortation of the apostle Paul in 2 Timothy chapter 2 verse 2 – “to entrust these things to able and faithful men who will entrust it to others” – for the glory of Christ and for the good of your souls. Let’s pray.Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your Word, and we are humbled by this trust and we ask on behalf of our brother, David, that You would uphold him as he fulfills this work, vital for the wellbeing of Your Church and Your mission in this world. Lord, thank You for Your faithfulness to Reformed Theological Seminary. It’s not our seminary; it’s Your seminary. Thank You that You have given us David, a man who loves Your Word, who loves You, who loves the truth, who loves the Gospel, and has a passion for investing in the able and faithful ministers of the Word who will shepherd the people of God and proclaim the Gospel in this world in this generation and in the generation to come until our Lord and Savior returns. Help him, bless him, use him, in Jesus’ name, amen.