BCM ministries and Baptist Colleges/Universities report 12,256 students who have indicated a call to vocational ministry. Local BCM ministries have indicated there are 3,532 involved in those ministries and 8,724 in Baptist institutions. Until recently, nothing was being done within Southern Baptist life to help these students and those in high school who have either made a commitment to ministry or are considering it.
A new and great resource has just been developed and released. It is sbccalled.com. It is loaded with great information. There are four major sections: PREPARATION, RESOURCES, EDUCATION and SBC INFO. To me one of the most readily helpful to a young person exploring God's call is under the RESOURCES section where it has a description of twenty three (23) different ministry positions and what they do. One of the struggles of many in wrestling with their call is seeing where they might fit, if they are not a preacher or a singer.
The PREPARATION section has super practical topics like Mentoring, Marriage Preparation, Financial Planning and there is an article titled, "Suggestions for Those Who Are Called" that just lays out a good general outline of how to proceed either in determining this call or beginning to figure it out. There is a listing of books related to calling and ministry, plus some websites that the student can go to for more help.
The EDUCATION section lists the different SBC Seminaries (with links), why consider seminary, Doctrinal beliefs of Southern Baptists, and even information about how SBC Funding works through the Cooperative Program. For high schoolers, there is a listing of Baptist colleges and universities which they might consider.
I highly recommend this resource to you as I am not aware of anything else out there like it. AND you do not have to be Baptist to benefit from it. This resource came about as a result of Bill Noe, who was the SBC Leader of Collegiate Ministry, and Steve Masters, BCM Campus Minister at LSU seeing the need. Steve was a part time Contract Worker with the Collegiate Ministry Office under Bill at Lifeway when this project was conceived. When Lifeway Christian Resources defunded the Contract Workers, Steve still believed this was such a need that he continued the development of sbccalled.com simply as a volunteer. I think what he has done is invaluable.
A COUPLE OF SUGGESTIONS: One, tell your students about it. Second, as you meet with students who are sensing or have made a commitment to vocational ministry, walk through it briefly with them. I think it will be easy for those who go to it the first time on their own to be overwhelmed and not find the parts most helpful to them at that point. Like most tools, it will take a little adjustment to learn to use it. But, it can be a super plus that they would refer back to as they develop in this process. And, we need to keep helping students sense God's call to vocational ministry.
Check out sbccalled.com.
Arliss Dickerson's brand new book, "A COLLEGE MINISTRY SUCCESS FORMULA". is available at amazon.com/books. College ministry pros say, "Must Read!!!"; "I read everything he writes."; "Quick read full o practical takeaways"; "Based on a successful career of leading and training leaders.".
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