by
Gabriel O. Olaniyan Ph.D Leadership and Administration
+234-803-615-8175, golaniyan@nbts.edu.ng
Goodnews E. Aghwana PhD Candidate, Systematic Theology
+234-806-098-2098, goodnewsaghwana@gmail.com
Luke Mayowa Ajiroba PhD Candidate, New Testament Language and Literature, +234-806-443-3025, almaluke442@gmail.com
ABSTRACT
Education plays a significant role in the development of the world’s nations. It is the passing of skills and knowledge from one generation to another, and its history reveals a division into primary, secondary, and tertiary known as higher education. Higher education has the classical academic, technical and vocational forms, and it also plays a vital role in the Christian community, which leads to Christian higher education. The article deals with the effects of funding Christian higher education in the twenty–first century for operative pastoral training through a descriptive method.Descriptively, the article looks at Christian higher education in Nigeria, the biblical basis for funding Christian higher education, contemporary challenges of Christian financing higher education and the way out, and lastly, the effect of inadequate funding of Christian higher education.
INTRODUCTION
It is a fact that education plays a vital role in the development of any institution – an important organisation of the nations in the world. Through education, passing skills and knowledge from one generation to another is inevitable. The history of education reveals a division into three stages: primary, secondary, and tertiary–higher education. The higher education level has different forms. These are the classical and academic, technical and vocational. Hence, as education plays a significant role in all institutions and organisations, so does it in the Christian community.
The Christian higher education in Nigeria and Africa respects these different forms of education, and this is why a citadel of learning about the thoughts of God regarding humanity, like the Nigeria Baptist Theological Seminary Ogbomoso and other theological institutions in Africa and Nigeria, admits students who are ready for tertiary education. Christian tertiary education has undergraduate and post-graduate studies. There are three types of Christian higher education in Nigeria and Africa. One is the church-controlled higher learning of theological institutions. The second is church-funded colleges and universities of higher learning. Finally, there is the Christian perspective of liberal arts colleges. Laba affirms that Baptist missionaries contribute to these forms of Christian higher education.
Looking carefully at Baptist history, the writers opine that Baptist missionary work in Africa, especially Nigeria, establishes that setting up educational institutions, both theological and secular, is of paramount concern for the denomination. However, the establishment and management of these institutions have slowed down in the last few decades. The writers believe that external and internal factors are responsible for this, but the challenge of funding Christian higher education is the most important. Christian higher education in the contemporary time is in an uncertain state of turmoiland sometimes denial. Most theological institutions have changed their modus operandi because they must tend toward profit-making colleges or institutions and no more extended mission agencies.
The writers will examine Christian higher education in contemporary Nigeriaby tracing the historical background via the Baptist mission work in Africa, especially Nigeria. Secondly, the writers will establish the biblical basis for funding Christian higher education. The writers will discuss the current challenges for financing Christian higher education and proffer the way out. Finally, before the conclusion, the writers will discuss some effects of inadequate funding for practical pastoral training.
CHRISTIAN HIGHER EDUCATION IN CONTEMPORARY NIGERIA
The writers believe that one of the outstanding grievances of many Christians is the history of higher education in Nigeria. Some, like the writers, have heard how most colleges, aside from the theological institutions, began with Christian foundations and the benefits the earlier students of higher education in Nigeria enjoyed. However, these colleges are slowly moving away from their faith-based foundations. The government is taking over all that once belonged to the Christian faith. Some schools of higher learning are changing their standards of behaviour, their leaders, their hiring policies, their church affiliations, their way of admitting students, their curricula, and even their mottos. Hence, Christian higher education in Nigeria tends towards the Nigeria higher education system.
Checking history, the Baptists’ first contact with the African continent was in 1821. Lott Carey and Colin Teague, pioneering Baptist work in Africa, carried out their missionary work in Liberia. Africa became the centre of attention of the Foreign Mission Board (FMB) at the first annual meeting of the newly organised Convention in June 1846. Cauthen et al. state that a significant statement was made at the annual meeting: “Another important place which the Board consider themselves specially invited to occupy is Africa! The Board is only waiting to secure men of suitable qualifications to enter the field. Africa is doubtless to be evangelised.” The statement reveals that right from the beginning of Baptist work in Africa, the missionariesintegrated education into their philosophy of ministry. Hence, it is recalled that the Foreign Mission Board sent ministers of the Gospel and teachers. The teachers laboured in the secular and religious education of West Africa, especially Nigeria.
The Southern Baptist Convention Annuals of 1876 reveals that the FMB sent qualified human resources and directed money investments towards opening schools as evangelism and church planting work was ongoing. The writers agree that the fundamental reason for the enterprise was to meet the educational and developmental needs of the people of Africa, especially Nigeria, the most populous nation in the continent. Laba reveals that local kings and indigenous churches invited missionaries to start public education schools for their wards in those early days. The expressed concern of the ministers of the Gospel caused them to take the initiative of educating the indigenous churches and localities. Hence, the missionaries participate in developing the countries of their mission enterprise. The writers believe that these avenues make Baptist schools serve as venues for spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
The characteristics of the education enterprise were establishing primary and high schools and equal chances of education for both boys and girls. The educational program covers areas like Agriculture, health, professional schools, domestic science, and handicrafts. The writers remark that there is credibility in recognition of the training of the girl-child by the Baptist missionaries. It was a significant breakthrough in West Africa, as Cole observes, especially in Nigeria, where the cultural norm was that women had no other role besides bearing children and caring for the home.Cauthen et al. assert that in the face of the opposition to girl-child education, Mrs Carrie G. Lumbley opened a girls’ school in Abeokuta in 1910.
However, a similar effort had earlier failed in Oyo town. The girls’ school in Abeokuta was later named “Idi-Aba” Baptist Girls High School, which eventually attained secondary level and later metamorphosised into a teacher training college.The writers found no information regarding women attending Bible schools in those early days. It seems that the cultural milieu could not allow women to be ordained ministers of the Gospel of Christ Jesus. Although there is still the need to address the situation in some Christian cycles in Africa and Nigeria today, things are changing for the better, as contemporary times reveal.
In religious education, there is a need to train qualified ministers of the Gospel of Christ Jesus in Africa, which led the Baptist Foreign Mission Board to start theological education institutions. The FMB provided some training facilities for the missionaries to start classes for the ministerial students. The training was about the core of the Christian message and beliefs. These were taught at the initial stage of the activity. Nevertheless, as the students’ levels of understanding increased, they were sent to the pastors’ training schools and later into much more structured institutions like the Bible seminaries for their diploma in theology.
Moreover, the Nigeria Baptist Theological Seminary (NBTS) Ogbomoso started in 1897. The institution was adequately staffed and equipped to become the “high place” of African theological education. Furthermore, the citadel becomes the haven of theological learning for other African Anglophone nations. There were also careful plans for further advanced training of young men at the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky, United States of America. Cauthen et al. submit that there was a partnership between the Nigeria Baptist Theological Seminary and the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary to strengthen the academic standard of the NBTS Ogbomoso. The two parties agreed to the association via aMemorandum of Understanding (MOU) established in 1948. Under the agreement, complete graduates from the NBTS Ogbomoso received a bachelor’s degree from the Louisville institution as long as the students met specific standards and the quality of instruction was maintained. The MOU was abolished during Professor Yusuf AmehObaje, and it is to the writers’ delight that the current leadership of the NBTS Ogbomoso is working tirelessly to re-enact the MOU.
Nevertheless, the writers affirm that the Nigeria Baptist Theological Seminary Ogbomoso is still a reference point in Africa in the consortium of theological education. The evidence in contemporary times is the increase in international students. The institution now offers a Master’s Degree in various fields of theological training, and the growth in the Doctoral Degree classes is remarkable and alarming. Some in Africa always think that the NBTS Ogbomoso is the only higher educational institution available for Baptists in Africa. Still, the institution has birthed two other Seminaries and five Baptist Colleges of theology. French students are given admission as long as their level of English meets the requirements. However, the NBTS Ogbomoso faces the everyday problems of any higher educational institute in Africa, especially Nigeria. The major ones are the lack of finance and lack of adequate infrastructure. The writers aim to address inadequate funding by examining the biblical basis for funding Christian higher education.
BIBLICAL BASIS FOR FUNDING OF CHRISTIAN HIGHER EDUCATION
Funding for Christian higher education is an offshoot of the funding for missions.Therefore, the writers employ biblical analysis to fund missions to find out what the scripture teaches regarding the funding of Christian higher education. The funding of Christian higher education is the deliberate practice of raising financial aid and allocating other relevant resources to propagate the Gospel of Christ. The course is to help in the adequate training of individuals called by God to engage in a personal search for values, meaning, and purpose in life, which allows a great deal of development in a nation and the entire cosmos.
However, one must note that “funding Christian higher education or funding missions” is not directly or categorically stated in the scriptures. Nevertheless, the writers indirectly mention various scriptures to the use of funds in accomplishing the purpose of the Church (1 Cor. 16:1-4; 2 Cor. 8 & 9; Phil. 4:10-17). Besides, over the years, the term “funding missions,” which results in the “funding of higher education,” has evolved into the theology literature. Some scholars dealing with the phenomenon have referred to it or implied it as “money and mission”, especially when it relates to the economy of the nations. The biblical analysis will be based on carefully selected scriptures from the Old and New Testaments depending on their relevance to “funding missions –funding Christian higher education.”
I. Funding of Yahweh’s Project in the Old Testament
The Old Testament explains that the Israelites always received Yahweh’s directionconcerning funding His works ascribed to His worship. In this regard, Yahweh was using the people themselves to provide for all that was needed for worship. The provision was through various offerings. Hence, it means Yahweh Himself initiated the process by which funds could be raised. Funding at this point was not limited to money but every resource that could help achieve Yahweh’s purpose at any particular time (Exod. 35:32-36).
Therefore, the Old Testament, especially the Pentateuch account of Exodus, can help contemporary church missions understand God’s mind regarding funding Christian higher education. Since Yahweh directed the funding process, modern church missions should embrace Yahweh’s leadership. The Old Testament recognises that after Yahweh had asked the Israelites to bring various items for setting up the Tabernacle in the wilderness (Exod. 35:4-8), there was the need for skill and ability, which also added to the funding of the wilderness project. Bezalel, Oholiab, and the other workforce members were to work with what they had to contribute, their skills and abilities. In this regard, the writers believe that most lecturers and some non-academic staff of places of Christian higher education, like the Nigeria Baptist Theological Seminary Ogbomoso, are working under God’s calling. The writers believe their remunerations are not proportional to what some of their contemporaries earn in a church. Hence, their sacrifices are also a part of the funding of Christian higher education.
Therefore, it is noteworthy that in the Old Testament, the offering God demanded spread across various sources, including human ability and material items to fund the building of a “mobile sanctuary.” The Tabernacle was a “mobile sanctuary” because it was the place of the Ark of the Covenant’s safekeeping. Moreover, the Tabernacle was carried from place to place when the Israelites were journeying to the Promised Land in the wilderness. Hence, raising funds was targeted at doing something in a particular way. At various points in the Old Testament, some situations warrant specific funding as God directs (Exod. 25:1-2; Deut. 14:22-29; Hag. 1:1-11; Mal. 3:7-12). Hence, the writers consider that the approaches of the Old Testament to funding Yahweh’s project are relevant to financing Christian higher education. Though the issue of funding Yahweh’s project in the Old Testament may be strange to some people in the current context, Verkuyl attempts to raise the individuals’ understanding by referring to funding missions as beginning in the Old Testament. Hence, the allocation of Christian higher education starts with Yahweh in the Old Testament.
The writers affirm that Yahweh has a universal motif of educating the world about His existence, deeds, and being. The process led to the choosing of the Israelites through their grand patriarch, Abraham, in the account of Genesis 11:27-32; 12. The process was followed by the missiological motif, the teaching motif of Yahweh, and the setting of Israel, free from Egyptian bondage. Israel was freed from bondage to save other nations and to teach others to follow the path of Yahweh (Isa. 49:6). The writers’ belief that the explanation brings to the fore a semblance of mission as the enterprise of Yahweh that had started earlier in the Old Testament. Therefore, it gives a basis to the current context to relate funding Christian higher education to the Old Testament funding of Yahweh’s project.
Having developed this relevant biblical principle, which cut across the other passages referred to earlier, the paper now turns its attention to the New Testament. The reason is that the New Testament continues biblical guidelines on funding Jesus’ mission. The ministry of the Apostles follows the New Testament guidelines.
II. Funding of Jesus’ Mission in the New Testament
Lukan’s account in 8:1-3 provides a concise but explicit picture of how Jesus’ ministry was funded. However, the narration does not reveal whether Luke intended to set out the funding aspect of Jesus’ ministry. It appears that Luke’s purpose was to project some basic Kingdom principles, which necessitated background information on what Jesus was doing at the time. Hence, Luke provides the geographical scope of the ministry of Jesus. Specifically, Jesus purposefully travelled about from one urbanand rural to another, proclaiming the good news of God’s Kingdom (Luke 8:1). It was within the context of the proclamation of the Gospel over a particular geographical space that took Jesus to these villages and towns and cities at the time.
Further, Luke informs in the first verse of 8 that Jesus had a team that He moved and worked with, the Twelve, who could be termed Jesus’ ministry core members. Likewise, some women and many others who had earlier been beneficiaries of Jesus’ ministry through deliverance from evil spirits and diseases (Vv. 1-2) were supporters in the financing of Jesus’ ministry. The writers believe that moving with a team as such requires some funding that needs to be regulated. Hence, the women in 8:1- 3 support Jesus through their means. Readers of the Lukan account believe this is where the funding needed for Jesus’ ministry becomes very apparent. The source of funds comes from the women. Hence, the uniqueness of the Gospel of Luke’s writings can be found in Gonzalez’s words.