Most seminary programs require entry level courses into important areas only to focus more heavily upon areas of ministry specialty and practical concern. Seminaries are under pressure as they work to attract prospective students to reduce the intimidating requirements of extensive language study, back-grounds, etc. At the end of the day, everything done w/i ministry is necessarily linked to the text of Scripture. We need to encourage the hard, tedious, and never-ending work of Biblical studies.

Second, I’m afraid that most assume that context means simply the 2 verses before and after the verse being considered. Obviously, this concern would be mute if we addressed that which is outlined above.

It goes w/o saying, however, that these fears are equally concerning whether we are discussing older leaders or younger leaders. In all reality, it seems to me that younger leaders have more responsibility in this area because we had the privilege of attending seminary during the ‘good days,’ when our older counter-parts were not provided the tools that we have come to expect. They were fed liberal challenges to the text; we were fed Sola Scriptura.