Weekly Email: June 23, 2025
I hope you're summer is going well! I know for me, it is the start of a busy season with much traveling, coach pitch baseball, and other summer activities.
In this week’s email:
New worship album from Boyce Worship Collective, Live in Alumni
Student Tip: How J.I. Packer Encouraged Me During Seminary (A Good Reminder for You and for Me) and giveaway
Program News: New course developments for the fall semester
A new promo video about Southern’s online program
New Music from Boyce Worship Collective, Live in Alumni
I don’t know about you, but I find well-done modern renditions of classic hymns to be one of the most encouraging and recentering things I can listen to during the week. Even more so when they’re led by Boyce College students in Alumni Chapel. The Boyce Worship Collective just released their new live album, Live in Alumni, this past Friday. It’s available wherever you stream music.
Over my past 10+ years at Southern, it has been exciting to see Boyce College grow from a small Bible college into a school that prepares the next generation with degrees in Business, Communication, PPE (Philosophy, Politics, and Economics), and more. I’ve known students who went on to law school, joined firms across the country, launched businesses, and stepped into a wide variety of callings. The biblical and theological foundation they receive, along with real-world training, makes Boyce College stand out.
You came to Southern because you trusted us with your theological education. That same vision, those same faculty, and that same commitment to biblical truth also shape the Boyce College experience. If you ever have questions about Boyce or know someone who does, I’d be glad to connect.
Student Tip: How J.I. Packer Encouraged Me During Seminary (A Good Reminder for You and for Me)
One of the greatest challenges I’ve noticed among seminary students today (and I struggled with this as well!) is the temptation to treat studies as mere tasks to complete, rather than truths to be transformed by. I recently read The Uncontrollability of the World, from cultural sociologist Hartmut Rosa that really resonated with me and had me thinking about when I first read J.I. Packer's classic book, Knowing God, in my seminary studies. Rosa describes the core of our modern problem as our relentless drive to control, manage, and predict everything. But he warns:
“Everything that appears to us must be known, mastered, conquered, made useful… Lurking behind this idea is a creeping reorganization of our relationship to the world.”
And even more strikingly:
“The driving cultural force of that form of life we call ‘modern’ is the idea, the hope and desire, that we can make the world controllable. Yet it is only in encountering the uncontrollable that we really experience the world. Only then do we feel touched, moved, alive.”
This reminded me so much of J.I. Packer’s classic book Knowing God, where he emphasizes the difference between merely knowing about God and truly knowing God. Packer writes:
“A little knowledge of God is worth more than a great deal of knowledge about him.”
He explains further how we bridge this gap:
“How do we turn knowledge about God into knowledge of God? The rule for doing this is demanding but simple. It is that we turn each truth that we learn about God into matter for meditation before God, leading to prayer and praise to God.”
For Packer, meditation isn’t passive; it’s actively dwelling in God’s presence:
“Meditation is the activity of calling to mind, and thinking over, and dwelling on, and applying to oneself, the various things that one knows about the works and ways and purposes and promises of God. It is an activity of holy thought, consciously performed in the presence of God, under the eyes of God, by the help of God, as a means of communion with God.”
My encouragement to you this week is to resist reducing theology to tasks or your lectures to checklists. Instead, approach your studies as encounters with Christ, as invitations to be shaped and transformed. Rosa reminds us:
“There is no way to ‘fabricate’ resonance, to instrumentally bring it about… the desire for control produces, behind our backs, a world that in the end is utterly uncontrollable in all the relevant aspects.”
Ultimately, your seminary journey isn’t about mastering theology. It’s about allowing yourself to be mastered by the One who is the very source of theology. As Packer puts it:
“Once you become aware that the main business that you are here for is to know God, most of life’s problems fall into place of their own accord.”
I’m praying for you this week as you pursue a deeper, richer encounter with God in your studies.
In light of this reflection from Knowing God, we're giving away one copy of the beautiful hardcover 50th edition from Crossway.
Enter the giveaway
Program News: Three New Course Developments for the Fall
There are three new course developments that I want to highlight that we have our first offering in the Fall:
Typology with Dr. Mitch Chase (Fall 2): This is Dr. Chase’s first online class he’s developed with with Southern Seminary. I’m sure you’re familiar with Dr. Chase’s books such as Typology and Allegory in the 40 Questions series and Short of Glory: A Biblical and Theological Exploration of the Fall. He also has a wonderful Substack on Biblical Theology. In addition to being a prolific author, he is also a seasoned pastor, being called to Kosmosdale Baptist Church in 2012, he is able to connect the pulpit to the classroom. I’m so excited he is now teaching online for us, bringing his academic expertise and pastoral wisdom to you.
Systematic Theology II with Dr. Kyle Claunch (Fall 1): Dr. Claunch has been at Southern since 2017 and has over 20 years of pastoral experience. Whenever I read feedback from his courses, students always mention the pastoral heart and academic expertise he brings to his classes. In this class you’ll be reading from theologians such as Herman Bavinck, Stephen Wellum, and Fred Sanders.
Practical Theology in Context with Dr. Colin McCulloch (Fall 2): Dr. McCulloch joined the Southern Seminary faculty this past year. Prior to that he’s been an elder and on staff at Farmdale Baptist Church since 2015. While this course is a biblical counseling course, it is a great one to take as you learn to apply much of the theology you learn in your other class. As Dr. McCulloch says, “you will come away with an ability to better see the connection between your theological convictions and the way that you live and minister to others. Additionally, I hope that you will be driven to see that ministry is never merely practical; it is always theological. Thus, you should never stop thinking about, delighting in, and seeking to live in accordance with the glorious doctrines of the Christian faith.”
New Online Promo Video
We just launched a new video highlighting online learning here at Southern. We will continually invest in bringing theological education to you, from here in Louisville, Kentucky. We want to come alongside you and your ministry, equipping you to be more faithful ministers of the gospel in your local context.
Quick Reference of Upcoming Term Dates:
Current Week: Summer, Week 4 (June 23–29)
Fall 1 Term Begins: August 4, 2025
Fall 2 Term Begins: October 6, 2025
Register for Courses →
Register for Fall Experiential Modulars →
Thanks for reading! I’ll check in next Monday. You can browse past emails in thearchiveor exploreCourse Snapshotsto find textbooks, course descriptions, and details about what we offer online.
