Bible College or Something “More Practical”?

“Why go to Bible school if it has nothing to do with my chosen career?” 

It’s a fair question, especially to those who have grown up in church and may feel they already have a good grasp on what the Bible says. Of course you want to make God happy, but a Bible college doesn’t have the majors you want for the career you are set on. Maybe you have big plans, like becoming a builder, a teacher, a pediatrician, or a Dolly Parton impersonator. How is learning the Bible going to assist with any of that? After all, you’re still going to go to church. You can get your Bible learning from church and your occupational learning from college. Win-win right? 

Well…not necessarily. If you are serious about living for God, then you have to be serious about understanding God’s Word. How can you live for God if you don’t understand what he wants? It doesn’t mean you won’t have a career in the field you are interested in, but it may change the way you go about it. Remember, Jesus is “the” way, and following his way may take some twists, turns, and detours you weren’t expecting. It’s harder to run fast on the narrow road than the wide one, but when we surrender ourselves to God’s timing and plan, you’ll learn it was worth it. 

“I already learn the Bible on Sundays at church, why should I go to college for it?”

Most churches, especially those who are seeker-sensitive, are going to be explaining the Bible in a way everyone in the congregation can understand, which means a lot of the depth is going to be left out to accommodate the listeners. It could be a bit disappointing if you are expecting an in-depth take on a passage. Not to mention, there is only so much you can communicate during an hour or two once a week to large audiences. There is often little responsibility on the congregation’s part to retain the information, critically evaluate it, or figure out how to practically apply it. This is not to say Sundays at church are useless, as they are very impactful, but their goal is very different from that of a Bible school. 

Another thing to keep in mind is that sermons are different from academic lectures as most pastors are doing more preaching than teaching from the pulpit. The pastors have already exegeted the passage and extracted a lesson that is applicable to the demographic they’re preaching too. They are spoon-feeding lessons  rather than teaching you how to fish for food yourself (don’t be offended, Paul did it too – giving people milk and not solid food (1 Cor. 3:2)). Of course you’ll learn certain lessons from the Bible, but without putting in the time studying it like you would at a Bible college, you shouldn’t expect to really own the knowledge the same way you would if you had been researching and writing papers about the topics. Remember, studying the Bible is an investment - if you only put a little effort in, you’ll only get a little return.

To truly be empowered by God’s word, you not only need to get God’s word in you, but you have to be able for it to come out of you too. Often, people rely on their pastors or religious leaders to be the medium who speak for God into their lives, but we know it was God’s intention for everyone to be educated in his Word (Deut. 5); even Moses’s desire was that everyone would be empowered by the knowledge of God (Numbers 11). These passages are something to keep in mind when making these big life decisions. If we really want God to be the one shaping our lives, we have to become dedicated students of his Word to know what he wants. He’s already spoken through his Word, now it’s our turn to choose to study it.

“How is learning the Bible going to help me with my career - it has nothing to do with the Bible.”

If you’re looking for worldly success then it's true - the Bible isn’t the best place to start. God’s hope for your life may look very different than your own plan for it, especially if your plan is just about making a name for yourself. Forgoing a biblical education will allow you to pick up some speed on the rat race of climbing the corporate ladder or finding material success. However, the lessons we derive from the Bible can flip our ideas of achievement upside down because for Bible-believing Christians, you’ll have to widen your concern to more than just your own well-being.

A Biblical education will switch the focus from ourselves, and help us to develop a collective understanding for success that is more concerned about developing healthy communities. For most people, they don’t want that. It’s more difficult, complicated, and time consuming. They’re too scared to give up their individual dream and have faith in God’s bigger plan. However, if you want to do something that lasts, you’ll need to do it God’s way, which you will learn through the Bible.  

Even working in the world, a biblical education will help you develop the discernment you need to be wise managers of the responsibilities God has blessed you with. There is wisdom found throughout the Bible which deals with a variety of entrepreneurial and life skills. A Biblical education will help develop you holistically, whereas a focused career education is only helping you learn an occupation. 

You are more than just your work, and so it’s important to seek an education which is going to develop you as a child of God, not just you as a teacher, audio technician, nose-hair stylist, or whatever profession you are dreaming of. If we are trying to be like Jesus, then we have to be firmly rooted in the Bible so we can apply it to any situation we may encounter - no matter what our career is. 

“So maybe I will go to a Bible College first….but how do I know if it’s a good one? I can’t risk unnecessarily racking up extra college debt by choosing a bad Bible college.”

Here’s a good checklist to help you decide:

▢  Do they teach you what the Bible says or do they mostly teach doctrine? 

▢  Do they empower you by equipping you with the critical thinking skills to accurately interpret scripture for yourself? 

▢  Do they spend enough time teaching about the socio-political context the stories take place in, so that you can understand the impacts of the biblical stories in their original historical culture before applying those lessons to your own culture? 

▢  Are they holistically concerned about you - spiritually, socially, even financially? 

▢  Do they have programs to help you graduate with as little debt as possible? 

▢  Does the Bible College contribute to the well-being of the community they exist within?

If you want one that meets all these criteria, then check us out at the Institute for G.O.D. Int’l.