Sometimes people (including me) get impatient with academic theology. It can seem like the people who study theology in academic institutions have lost touch with the realities of life for most Christians, and with the living reality of God. Theologians are studying and arguing about details that only a tiny handful of people in the world know about and understand. Does it really matter? Does academic theology really help anyone? Is it all detached from God?
So I want to share 3 ways that theologians, professional academics, help me as a pastor. This is not to say that all academic theolog is good. There is much that is unhelpful. But there are also real benefits that flow from academic theology that are hard to get without the academic setting and discipline.
1) Theologians (and especially biblical scholars) notice and check out the details most of us skim over. Checking every manuscript version of a verse in the original language. Chasing up a source to see when a claim was first made. This detail work can highlight something we would otherwise miss. It can give us confidence in the Bible text as we have it. It can make us reassess something we had assumed that is not actually what is there. This detail work includes creating the resources that pastors and other scholars use- the dictionaries and databases that allow others to do their work. A friend who does this sort of detailed work is Kim Phillips, whose substack is Kim L Phillips | Substack .
2) Theologians (and this is helped by historical theology, as well as doctrine and biblical theology) notice and bring to our attention deep connections and structures to the Bible and to theology. Biblical theologians highlighting the role of covenants in the unfolding story of the Bible (e.g. Meredith Kline). Systematic theologians showing how everything flows from the fullness of life the triune God has (e.g. John Webster). Often, after the insight is shared, it seems obvious and even simple. But this sort of drawing out deep connections requires a vast amount of reading and thinking, beyond what most pastors have time for. And these deep connections and structures help pastors in sermon preparation and ongoing Bible study.
3) Theologians and apologists help see connections and challenges in wider culture. By being able to immerse themselves in reading, listening and conversations with specific parts of modern culture (e.g. physicists, AI experts, musicians, political activists etc.) alongside time in the Bible, theologians help us to see ways we are being shaped by our culture. They help us not to be trapped in false ways of thinking unwittingly. They help us to give answers for the hope that we have in Jesus in ways that connect well with culture. Someone like Dan Strange (Dan Strange – A Spiritually Open Culture? An Evangelical Response) helps pastors think about issues before they start emerging in congregations or as questions seekers ask.
Academic theology is not the path everyone will choose. It is a peculiar niche for a few people with particular gifts and interests. But at its best it is helpful for the church. Academic theologians engaging in study and discussion help equip pastors and the church. By highlighting truth. By humbling misplaced overconfidence. By pointing to connections between Bible passages and theological truths. By engaging with the best and most influential areas in the world around us. And through all this, by helping us to see God’s great plan in Jesus, and how Jesus really is the ultimate answer and best news for everyone.
Jots and Scribbles 