From Joey...

Gates to the Divinity School at University of St Andrews

I wanted to write this blog post for those of you from our church family in Starkville and others who have been a part of this journey as a way of sharing about what brought me in particular to St. Andrews and to do the work that I'm doing here. It's also a way of introducing you to my own personal blog (www.jhsherrard.blogspot.com), which will be up and running soon. So if you're just here for updates about our family and pictures, rest assured. All will be back to normal soon enough!

What's funny about all of this is that not much of this was clear to me as it unfolded. It's only in reflection, looking back, that I'm able to trace what God has done. Much of life is like that, I know, and it gives witness to the fact that God is at work, guiding even while we are unaware.

It not easy to name a starting point for the journey that's led us to Scotland but a marker along the way was a class I took my sophomore year at Rhodes College - Philosophy and the Christian Faith. The class wasn't so much what it was titled; it was really a survey of the writings of C.S. Lewis (I hear you chuckling, FPC). The class was all kinds of things - I learned some about who Lewis was and much about who he was not - but I can in particular remember reading a passage Lewis wrote about the Trinity as a communion of love that was particularly moving. It ended up being the topic I wrote about in my final paper for the class - a paper that I've not been able to find and that's probably for the best!

Good ol' Clive Staples Lewis

Fast forward to my senior year of college as I was trying to find a topic for my senior paper as a Religous Studies major. As providence would have it, just before I needed to submit a paper topic I was attending a conference on the Eastern shore of Maryland at a place called the Trinity Forum Academy. The Academy's director, Ryan Messmore, gave a talk while we there about the Trinity - in particular the concept of perichoresis, a word that the early church used to describe the relationships among the persons of the Trinity. Ryan's talk, the concept he shared about that day - it moved me in much the same way as that passage from Mere Christianity and when it came time for me to submit my senior paper topic I decided to follow up on what I'd learned.

The experience of writing the senior paper was a capstone on my time at Rhodes. It was a time of engaging with the Christian tradition in a way that I'd never done before. It was a time of growing in my knowledge of God and communion with him. And it was also full of all kinds of 'coincidences.' On a trip to Regent College in Vancouver over spring break with my good friend Dave Abney it just so happened that the author of two books I was researching, Miroslav Volf, was lecturing one evening. I also stumbled across a book called Embodying Forgiveness which was on sale at the Regent bookstore that was written by someone named Greg Jones. Each of these enriched the final paper - and as silly as the finished product looks to me today it was nonetheless an important event for me. 

 The Trinity Forum Academy

 

To make a long story only slightly shorter, the week before I graduated I found out that I would had been accepted as a fellow at the Trinity Forum Academy. During that time Ryan taught further on the doctrine of the Trinity, a topic that had become important to him through a visiting professor at Duke Divinity School, Nicholas Lash. Ryan was a Duke alum and he encouraged me to look closely at studying there before I graduated. They had a great young dean of the seminary - the aforementioned Greg Jones - who was putting together an impressive faculty.

Blacknall on a Sunday

I ended up attending Duke and I learned much there. But if I were to name what was most transformative about Duke I would have to say it was the church family Kate and I found there - Blacknall Presbyterian Church. There I was shepherded and taught by a couple of great pastors in Allan Poole and Peter Hausmann. My life with God was sustained through corporate worship (now being a part of worship in the UK I've thought much about the worship leader Dave Stuntz as I've heard all the Timothy Dudley Smith and Stuart Townsend praise songs). And the congregation was full of so many wise saints.

Jeff McSwain

One in particular was Jeff McSwain. Jeff directed Young Life in the Durham/Chapel Hill area (he now heads up this amazing ministry) and during my middle year at Duke was the speaker at the men's retreat Blacknall held. While there, Jeff unfolded a reading of the New Testament and the person of Jesus that was deeper, more powerful and grace-filled, and life-giving in a way I'd never heard it. It was both disorienting and refreshing. And it made me curious for more. Over the next few months Jeff and I began to meet to discuss what he'd taught. He pointed me to one theologian in particular - T.F. Torrance - and also talked about his experiences studying for a year in St Andrews, Scotland with TF's nephew, Alan Torrance.

T.F. Torrance

The ideas Jeff shared with me followed me as I left Duke. It set me on a journey through my time as a pastor at FPC Starkville. I tried to incorprate what I'd learned through Jeff in my teaching and pastoring - more unsuccessful than not, I am afraid. I read and re-read one book in particular, The Mediation of Christ. And along the way, the coincidences kept happening.

Andrew Purves

The summer of 2010 the senior pastor of FPC, Olin McBride, went on sabbatical and we brought in a guest speaker for our Adult Bible School named Andrew Purves. I'd heard much about Dr. Purves from the congregation and from friends but while he was with us I was able to spend quite a bit of time with him. Over lunch, over dinner, over coffee that week I learned from him and was encouraged by him. The final night of his time with us, he encouraged me to think about pursuing a PhD.

 FPC Starkville, our wonderful church home

The next summer, our Adult Bible School speaker canceled on us late in the game and we scrambled to find an able speaker who would step in. As we pursued speakers, the one who was able to work it in their schedule was a man named Gary Deddo. Gary was a seminary professor, book editor for Intervarsity, and advocate of the Torrance tradition of theology. He had studied with TF's brother, J.B. (Alan's father, TF's brother) and during his time with FPC he taught about the doctrine of the Trinity. He and I also talked about PhD studies, and he helped me to think much more clearly about what I would study and how it might take place.

Later that summer I began to put together PhD applications together for three schools in Scotland - St Andrews, Edinburgh, and Aberdeen. We were by no means sure that this was the right thing for our family, but we also knew that the window for this kind of opportunity was one that could close very quickly. So we started the process. I had finished the bulk of my application for St Andrews when it became clear that Olin was about to receive a call from another church. As Kate and I prayed and talked it over, it became clear that this would put PhD studies on hold. Our church family in Starkville meant the world to us and we felt a clear call to stay and be a part of the transition to a new senior pastor. I completed my application to St Andrews to study with Alan with the aim of deferring for a year.

Alan Torrance, my supervisor

As the spring of 2013 rolled around, it very rapidly became clear that God was calling us to St Andrews and that I would be able to study with Alan there. After much waiting, praying, and then more waiting, quite a bit happened in a very short amount of time. God continued to introduce people into our lives, including a friend, guide, and counselor whose brother-in-law studied at St Andrews, who helped us to think through the process. That was followed by the provision of funding which made studying in St Andrews much more feasible. God provided a senior pastor for the church who will lead the congregation forward. And when we broke the news to our families, to our church, and to our friends we could not have anticipated how supportive they would be. 
 

All of this adds up to what I can only name as a sense of God's leading and guidance on us. Through all of the 'coincidences,' the waiting, the events that so clearly we were not in control of, God has lead us to this place. Being here, I'm reminded that we're still being led. The 'coincidences' continue - friendships which are forming that are a part of the story I've just shared, the support of our church family, ways God has provided for us even in this month we've lived here. The topic I'm studying, T.F. Torrance's doctrine of the Trinity, takes up what I worked on as a senior in college alongside what Jeff shared with me on that men's retreat during seminary. Where it will all go, we don't know. But we're thankful for God's provision thus far, for the assurance that He is leading.