MENTORING
A key element of the Seminary’s pastoral training is its mentorship program. The Seminary uses ordained pastors and elders to provide personal and pastoral mentorship for all full- and part-time matriculating M.Div. students during their enrollment.
Embodied Wisdom
Mentors embody pastoral wisdom for the Seminary’s students. Their personal knowledge, pastoral experience, and spiritual maturity offer living examples of godly devotion and service to Christ that neither bricks-and-mortar seminaries nor online classrooms can adequately capture. As pastor-mentors, they have a crucial opportunity to ensure that orthopraxy never wanders from orthodoxy in the lives of our aspiring pastor-students.
Nominating a Mentor
The mentor-nominee is normally the student’s own pastor or another pastor or elder who has had close familiarity with the applicant and his family for about three years or more. The Seminary’s administration must approve the nominated mentor, confirming he is qualified, capable of fulfilling the mentor’s role, and willing to take on the responsibility of mentorship.
Mentor Qualifications
A nominated mentor should have received a formal theological education himself, be in basic agreement with the historic creedal and confessional standards of the Reformed tradition, as recognized by the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches (CREC; see Doctrinal Commitments above), and been an ordained and practicing minister or elder in a Reformed church for at least five years. Mentors are not required to be members of the CREC. If the student is unable to identify a qualified mentor, the Seminary will assist the applicant in finding one.
Mentor Responsibilities
Mentors associated with the Seminary’s pastoral training program are tasked with discipling, counseling, encouraging, challenging, modeling, and shaping the student during his participation in the M.Div. program. A mentor is not an academic instructor but more of a “life-and-callings coach.” He helps the student deepen his relationship to Christ and the church, refines and disciplines his character and manner of the student’s life according to the biblical qualifications for pastors and elders, and sharpens and applies the student’s seminary studies to his personal life, family, work, Christian service, and church ministries.
Mentors are asked to invest their time, wisdom, and experience for the next generation of pastors for as long as the student remains a part of the Seminary’s pastoral training program, and hopefully longer.
Regular Meetings
Students and mentors are expected to meet regularly (as often as weekly, no less than monthly), for at least an hour each time, to discuss their devotional life, prayer habits, blessings, temptations, course work, personal challenges, self-discipline, self-sacrifice, service to others, time management, and how the student is putting their learning into practice. These meetings should be face-to-face, whether live or online.
Mentor Reports
Mentors are asked to submit a “Mentor’s Report” to the Seminary at or before the end of each term. The Mentor should discuss their report directly with their student-mentee at the time of submission. The mentoring report indicates when and how long the mentor and the student met, records observations about the student’s personal and spiritual development, and assesses the overall health of the student’s personal, familial, work, and church life. Note: Students who receive an unsatisfactory Mentor Report are not allowed to enroll in a new term until an action plan for implementing corrective measures is submitted.
Important Report Deadlines
The timely filing of the Mentor’s Report, at or before the end of each term, is required because students are not allowed to continue their studies or enroll in a new academic term without a satisfactory report or action plan on file with the Seminary prior to the start of the next term.