Introduction of our new President
This year, an exciting new chapter has begun for the seminary in our training of pastors for gospel ministry.
Ian Hamilton has become the Chairman of our Board, and Donald John MacLean has succeeded him as our President. We are deeply grateful to God for the wisdom, humility and expertise with which Dr Hamilton served as President, and for his ongoing role as Professor of Historical Theology. We also praise God for raising up in Dr MacLean, a man who shares Ian’s commitment to catholic-spirited, missionary-minded and doctrinally rich training for the next generation of ministers.
“It is my fundamental conviction that there is no more important work I can give my time to than seeing men trained up for gospel ministry.” — Donald John MacLean
We invite you to find out a little more about our new president’s vision for the seminary by watching his conversation with Dr Jonathan Master, President of Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, with whom Westminster is a proud partner institution.
From the President
In preparing teaching on eschatology (the occasion for many happy re-readings of The Pauline Eschatology by Geerhardus Vos!), the centrality of hope to the Christian life has been much on my mind.
Beyond doubt, hope is one of the great features of living Christianity. It is one of the three cardinal virtues of the Christian life, “So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three...” (1 Cor. 13:3). In the New Testament, hope is a fundamentally eschatological thing. It is looking, in faith, to what is not yet. So, Vos says, “The Christian is saved ‘upon the basis of hope’, for hope and the things upon which it terminates constitute the supreme goal of salvation (Rom. 8:24).” The hope of ever being with the Lord— the hope of resurrection glory—are integral to our Christian experience.
Hope in the New Testament is an intensely practical thing. It is a key to unity among God’s people (Eph. 4:4). With one end in view, one hope being looked to, how, then, can there be division here? It is tied to joy and peace (Rom. 15:13). The joy of believing in Christ, the peace that brings, stirs up the hope of what is to come. And reciprocally, the more hope is in our hearts, the greater the joy and peace we will have. With good reason, Vos says, “The believer’s hope is a most potent ferment and stimulant in the religious consciousness of early Christianity.”
Hope, then, is a glorious thing. Please pray that it fills the hearts of our students and lecturers, that it may overflow into their sermons and teaching, so all who hear them will know joy and peace in believing.
