I think it is very important that preachers of today need to be seminary trained .

i say that because there are no more dumb folk in the church and i feel that it is a sad day for the preacher if he has somebody in the congregation that knows more about the bible than the preacher. Also i feel that if the pulpit is dumb then the pews are dumb.

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Ahhh my Dear Ach Moreh....LOL....you're something else. Though you are 'taking a break' glad to hear from you. i hope and trust all is well. How did your discussion go with asking the prophets to write in about their calling? LOL I started to respond but chose to keep my head instead ...ROFL

Seriously, I do hope all is well and that we will hear from you soon---you keeps it live up in here Brotha!
+++sjh
I must say that I agree with part of this, because the bible explicitly states in II Timothy 2:15 that we are to "Study to show ourselves approved unto God".........however, I know that Seminary can NOT teach you how to relate to the needs of your congregation.Some of us Seminarians are so STUCK on our education, that we FORGET that we lead people who care LESS about the $10 paper our degrees came on, that we learned Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic, that we know the Septuagint, ALL they want to know is.....IS THERE A WORD FROM THE LORD!!!!! Not from Oral Roberts University, Liberty University, Columbia Theological, and all these seminaries BUT FROM GOD!!!!

MOST of US seminarians are USELESS to the body of Christ, because we talk OVER the people's head with ALL of our big words and etc. INSTEAD of making the Word of God PLAIN enough for a Child to understand and that a Fool won't error. And this is coming from someone who has been to seminary and in all honesty who uses VERY little of it.
Oh my Bishop-Elect....I would not dare say that I am useless to the Body of Christ....that's a heavy statement. Upon what evidence is this founded? Pastors do a whole lot more than just preach and teach, wouldn't you say? And we are useless because of our use of our vocabularies. WOW!

Elect, I believe that I am more valuable to the body, bringing them a synergy of training, discipline, experience, revelation, anointing, and the blood sweat and tears of my spiritual predicessors.

So do you think it was a mistake for you to go to seminary...were you out of the will of God to do so? It seems strange that God would send you to school to prepare you, and then deem that same preparation as useless and unnessary. Preaching where people live is the result of wisdom, sensitivity, and experience. I preached over folks' heads without seminary...until a mentor told me I was older than my years and quite before my time....he helped me learn how to preach so that I reached ALL levels of intellects....wisdom, experience, AND seminary augmented this.

I cannot concur that seminary does not prepare me to deal with my people....I went to a black seminary....my training in administration and finance and clinical pastoral counseling certainly made me more adept and being sensitive to the mental, economic, and spiritual plight of my people. It would be a poor testimony of my stewardship of time, tuition money, training, and intellectual accumen if I went to school and did not use what I had learned to better do my job. But I say to each his or her own.....let us fear God and keep His commandments.....just wanted to offer the perspective of another seminarian who KNOWS that training has not rendered her useless to the WHOLE Body of Christ. Quite frankly Sir, with 28 years of ministerial experience, school AND the school of hard knocks, mentoring, training AND the anointing, I still find being effective in ministry to our people an on-going, some-times painful challenge. I doubt that I have it just right YET---lol. Please keep a sista bishop in your prayers.

+sjh
Grace to you Bishop Hyman, YES!! my statement is VERY HEAVY, and the evidence that it is founded upon is through my 22 years of preaching and 20+ years of music ministry for various denominations, fellowships and etc. Within these years of my experience, I've seen and heard the LOOKS and PERPLEXING voices of those in the various settings and the LOOKS and PERPLEXITY is because MOST of US seminarians have become so infused with showing-off our educational exploits that we FORGET that we MUST make the Word of God simplistic, relevant, and most importantly revealing.

YES!! Pastors do a lot more than preach and teach, We are USELESS when in fact the people that we minister to have NO CLUE as to what we're teaching or preaching (OUR sermons are/should NOT draw attention to OUR ACCOMPLISHMENTS educationally, but draw attention to Christ) by this I mean WE can SOMETIMES give our congrants TOO MUCH of US, and OUR TRAINING, I again state as I did in a earlier post, Jesus, was very PROFOUND YET SIMPLE in his teachings. Our educational training STILL needs the AUTHENTICITY of the Anointing AND our personal experiences to relate to those we serve.

I NEVER named an indivdual person in my post as USELESS, my statement was MOST (Bishop, if you KNOW that you're NOT in this category, then disregard it) you and I BOTH have been in ministry for quite a long time and WE'VE witnessed this amongst our ranks, even in OUR own ministry experiences, we've been TOO DEEP for the people we ministered to (you referred to this in your reply) and it wasn't the seminary that corrected us, it was our Pastor, Bishop, Apostle, Spouses or even the PEOPLE let us know.

NO, it was't a mistake, I didn't miss GOD (because he did NOT tell me to go) I chose to because I wanted the experience of the formal training I had been in ministry for almost 9 or 10 years before I even enrolled, BUT even without the training or the degree, I was effective in the preaching and teaching of the Word of God because I studied with intensity and listened for God's insight into my studies. I STILL believe that seminary (Black OR White) does NOT teach us how to relate to our people, because they give us the MECHANICS and METHODS of Preaching, Sermon Preparation, and even Counseling, but it doesn't teach us the SENSITIVITY or EMOTIONS of a mother who's buried her only son, or the father who wants to commit suicide because he can't provide for his family because his job closed down, or the child who's struggling with the fact that they're adopted and they're searching for their parents. YES!! it teaches MECHANICS, METHODS, and PHILOSOPHICAL APPROACHES, BUT if WE'VE been through it, our PERSONAL testimony will outweigh our training and the people WILL appreciate our transparency.

Bishop Haymon, I love you my "SISTA" Bishop (lol) and may the blessings of the Lord be richly, reverantly, and righteously be multiplied to you and your ministry. Grace and Peace. P.S. I PRAY FOR U & U PRAY FOR ME.....DEAL????
My Dearest Bishop Elect....we can agree to disagree on some of these points. My 28 years of experience in ministry and 31 years in music ministry have afforded me a very different experience I see we have alot in common--however (: . I cannot make a statistical statement about the uselessness of those outside of my experience, and should be careful in how I judge the effectiveness and usefulness about this in my perceptual field. But I understand where you are coming from.

Yes Sir, I did say that I have preached over people's head (and I did that WITHOUT a seminary degree). I suppose I do it ever so often now--but that is hardly attributable to my seminary training alone. While I am certain that the culmination over 16 years of training in higher education constitute an aspect of it, there are other concomintants---intellectual acumen, the gift of reveleation, and still--the lack of certain kinds of experiences (since we haven't attained ALL yet). Admittedly, I do use vocabulary and philosophies to preach and teach---just as Yeshua and most of the OT propehts used language, allegory, metaphores and parables. His teaching, in many instances, was anything BUT simple....thus confounding many. I learned vocabulary from those who were greater than I----what kind of teacher fails to expose his or her disciples to greater thinking, greater ways of expressing words, greater revelation, and greater knowledge and wisdom?

It was my SEMINARY TRAINED Bishop who taught me about reaching people where they are and leading them up and out into where they should be. It was my homiletics mentor, the late great Dr. Myles Jones, who shared with me about the "language" of my preaching--and how to use language and humor to take the "bite" of my prophetic preaching (since he said my preaching makes people do what they don't like to do--THINK). The anointing didn't teach me that--my mentor/instructor did. He critiqued my preaching....my dialogue with him was dynamic and interactive....what we learned in the classroom was mechanics--what I learned from the instructor was the wisdom of God. I learned the how-to of preaching--but also how NOT to preach, and what DOESN'T work.

As a psychologist, and former educator, I agree with some of the things you've said---the profs taught me philosophies of human behavior, methods of dignoses and treatment, how to educate and lift people's minds--and the mechanics of doing so. TRUE--They could not REALLY teach me how to connect with a soul, or how to be emotionally present with a client or student who was distraught or frustrated from a book. However, they did teach me TO do these things, and mentors within those educational system taught me the necessity of having connecting and empathic relationships with those whom I serve. Some even worked personally with me until I learned HOW to do it. That is the the importance of mentoring and supervision. The key is mentoring--not merely curriculum. Perhaps, that is where we digress from each other philoshpically and experientially Sir---you think (: ?

Likewise, seminary taught me the importance of connecting with people--and my mentors taught me HOW to do so. Expertise doesn't come from books--it comes from being submitted to people greater than we (in and out of the walls of academe)---and from practicing under their supervision---until we get it like they have it. The state of VA says that whether I know how to connect with people, am sensitive, or gifted ti discern people's pain, I MUST demonstrate that I know the mechanics, philosophies and the HOW TO's---or else I cannot practice on people.

I would venture to say Bishop-Elect, that "mechanics" without the anointing ARE potentially dangerous, but the anointing WITHOUT the proper mechanics is just as potentially damaging. Also, my BROTHA-Bishop-Elect, I would also venture to say that when I was coming up--Bishops had awesome anointings, heavy revelation, and preached with power and conviction...unfortunatley, I don't see the same thing on many in our generation of bishops--at least not from my purview. Some of them were seminary trained, but many were not. But in light of the fact that old-school seemed to be under a heavier anointing, many today will need the additional training so they won't be difficient at least in that area.

Also Dear Sir, it would seem to me that if you spent three years in seminary, spent 3 years of money for tuition and God didn't tell you to go---that constitutes a "MISS".....LOL. As I said, we will probably not agree on this issue. We CAN agree to pray for each other--you pray for me, and I'll pray for you--LOL!!!!! Much love to ya----by the way, when is your consecration??? Is you skerred? LOL
Peace and blessing my dear Brotha!
+++sjh
Bishop, I appreciate your candid and proven GENUINE heart for what God has called you to. YES!! we DO have much in common and even some differences BUT the good outweighs the bad. So we move from this discussion and to answer your question my consecration will be during our Holy Convocation on September 19th, and in all honesty NO, I'm not skerred (lol) however I'm deeply humbled by the elevation.
Wow, that's great Bishop-Elect. I was also consecrated in September (on the 21st --seven years ago in '02)....seems we have timing and season in common too.

I was skerred...especially when I had to meet with the board of bishops for an unplanned meeting and examination the night before my consecration. Unfortunately, I was sooooo tired by the time of the consecration, I can't remember all of it---still seems like a dream.

When they conscrated me and commissioned me as apostle--I was REAL skerred for the THREE years....the warfare was atrocious, I saw a few recently put in office DIE, many people are unbelieving, and the office grossly misunderstood. I secretly wondered if the council of bishops and apostles had missed it... I dare NOT say a word to contend with my leaders' decision. Now had they set me in the prophet's office, there would be little question. I've been doing that since age 17....but this apostolic realm was a horse of another color!

I've now settled into who and what I am ---offering God very little opposition about it. But it ain't no joke. There is quite a bit of persecution that accompanies the office....and LAWD--don't have no education and be a female....Jesus, Come to the Meetin'!!!!!!!!

It is strange to view myself as the same thing my spiritual parents were--especially my late father in ministry (who left us suddenly and WAY too soon). My leaders were just so HEAVY in the anointing, and in revelatory word---and they were HOLY!!!! It's hard to believe that I have become what they were---that is just unreal to me. if I could just be HALF the bishop my father was, and HALF the apostle his Mother in the Gospel was--I believe I could be "useful"....lol

Keep me posted on your path to the episcopacy....and let me know if I can help. Definitely count me in your corner as a tag-team prayer partner if and when the warfare gets CRAZY as you near the 19th.

Blessings,
+++sjh
I see we DO have MORE in common, you were consecrated in 2002 (The Year of the Double) that was the theme of my home church, and it was also the year that God spoke to me explicitly as he did to Abram in Genesis 12:1-3 and I instructed to leave my home of Atlanta (where I've lived ALLLLL of my life) where my ministry was known, both in music and ministry and move here to Jackson, MS where I knew NO ONE other than my wife (who at that time was my fiancee'). And 7 years later (completion/maturity) the Lord has placed me under an Open Heaven because of my obedience to his word (although I was very reluctant and tried to bring God to a compromise, DIDN'T WORK THOUGH- lol)

My biggest and most nervous and scary moment was when I recently attended the Joint College of Bishops in Cleveland, OH which is led by Bishop J. Delano Ellis, II and seeing ALL of these Bishops in the Lord's Church, Men & Women whom I've admired from close-up and from afar. Sitting in classes with these great minds, eating lunch or dinner, having infectious conversations about this office and etc. THEN it hit me that I was in the company of these Prince and Princesses in the Lord's Church and I'm about to become another link in this chain.

I had a very deeply emotional moment, just reflecting on where I've come from (from childhood to adulthood) only wishing that the 5 most important people in the spectrum of my life were alive and here to witness their prayers, laying on of hands, discipline/rebukes, encouragement and love being made manifested, My Mommy (the GREATEST single parent EVER), My Aunt (1st Women Pastor who TAUGHT me the Word), My Grammy (who was the joy of my life), My Bishop J. Howard Dell-C.O.G.I.C.(who taught me Holiness, Ethics of Ministry, Manhood) and My Daughter Myesha Aiyanna (Daddy's Boopie) So sorry, didn't mean to give you my history, just kinda hit me again as I was typing, SORRY.

Okay back to the reply (lol) the warfare has already begun, we recently had a Pastor who was an Advisory Board member to leave the fellowship (after being rebuked by me) and some others in whom he had been talking to, BUT I told God that I'll let nothing separate me from my destiny and I asked him to reveal to me the motives and intents of the people he's given me and if they're not in this fellowship for the right reasons remove them so that those who want to become apart of what he's assigned my hands to do can enter. But know this, I WILL call upon you and when I do, DON'T ACT like you don't know a brother. Grace and Peace to you, My Sista!!!!
Ok---this IS getting a ittle crazy.... I find that we have even more in common. I see you have lost a few key people in your life too-- I am sure at times, you long for them---if no more than just to ask them "what to do". My aunt was my biggest fan and encourager, and my granny was my rock--she taught me GOD--not just out of the text, but through her intense walk with God.

I came to know Christ through her, and entered into a most intimate engulfing relationship with God through her. It was from this, and the searching of divine patterns in the scriptures that I have concluded that the person of God cannot be learned from the text--God must be learned through creation and through another man or woman. My late bishop also taught me anther dimension of God--and how to walk in that dimension while yet in the earth. My god-mother, the late Elder Gloria Collins, taught me the dynamics and discipline of hot, ferverent prayer, and spiritual warfare---she was my chief intecessor (along with my grandmother)---Gone away from here!!!!! My Granny just died last year--I preached the funeral--and am just adjusting to the absence of her physical presence (though her spirit is still very influential).

How about THIS??? There is an apostolic network that I birthed out--when I had to bring correction to one of the bishops (though I HATED to do it because he was my senior in the bishopric), he got enraged, bailed, and took my ideas and vision with him, and started his own. They are doing better than I am--lol---go figure.

Get this--I founded my church in Full Gospel....was submitted and committed in the fellowship for 9 years. My regional bishop, the late Antonio D. Thomas consecrated me and commissioned me as an apostle (outsideof the fellowship of course, because at that time --there WERE no women bishops or FGBF consecrated apostles.) At age 41, he dismissed Bible STudy at his church, and then left up outta here--gone. He left us suddenly just like my spiritual father did. I could not believe this actually happened to me twice in a life-time.

It's been a season of tremendous losses of great anointed men and women of God---I'm not sure I get it---but it sure is enough to make me live right all I know (:

We seem to enjoy some of the same preachers--and I have been all over the country singing, training, and directing choirs--and directing choirs for some of the gospel greats of our time. Uncanny Bishop-Elect!!! For a long time, I was more known for my musical proweress than my preaching.

Glad you got a chance to attend the Joint College of Bishops in OH---I have alwayse thought Bp. Ellis was a depot of wisdom! He was Bishop Jessie Ellis when we were coming up--he was off the chain 20 years ago. I always appreciated his candor. These are the kinds of experiences OUTSIDE of the classroom that also impact our character, expertise, anointing, and abilities--see we do agree on something--LOL!!!! I just personally think we need BOTH to be the most effective, not one over the other.

For real, I will keep you in prayer--and will call your name before God. Holla--ok? And I'll try to ACT LIKE I know a brotha.? LOL--you're too funny. Thank God for a little disagreement--great things emerge out of a little tension.

Blessings
++sjh
Get this--I founded my church in Full Gospel....was submitted and committed in the fellowship for 9 years. My regional bishop, the late Antonio D. Thomas consecrated me and commissioned me as an apostle (outside of the fellowship of course, because at that time --there WERE no women bishops or FGBF consecrated apostles.) At age 41, he dismissed Bible STudy at his church, and then left up outta here--gone.

This is SUPER CRAZYBishop, I've been apart of Full Gospel Baptist since 96', as a matter of fact, Bishop Antonio Thomas was our Regional Bishop and in attendance when my Bishop (C.L. Carter,Sr.) was elevated to General Overseer by Bishop Morton and State Bishop Sherman Young. I had the awesome opportunity to play on several ocassions at our church, he was an awesome Preacher and Prophet, I enjoyed his ministry tremendously. Bishop, would it be safe to say that our paths may have crossed and we didn't even know it??? You're absolutely right, GREAT things emerge from tension, DESTINY, PURPOSE, MINISTRY, VICTORY all emerge from tension!!! I'm GLAD that our paths crossed. I need your expertise on something as it relates to building the fellowship that God birthed from me should I asked from here (BPN) or should on your personal email, whichever you'd prefer is fine with me. Let's keep uncovering COMMON areas of ministry that we share.
This IS Crazy....I came into the fellowship in 1996!!! LOL That thing like to have KILT me when Bishop Thomas died--I had just talked to him two days before....in fact, I left the fellowship in October--3 weeks before he died--we talked for over an hour before he released me. ANY way....this still stings a little because as I said before, my father in ministry--I mean my REAL--raised me from 19 years old--father died suddenly like that --right in my face. Riviting!

How about this? I have been the presence of Bishop Young several times--even in the last 2 or 3 years....I was on a consecrating council of bishops with him.

I'll be willing to bet you that our paths have crossed! Too much Bishop-Elect. Sure we can chat--hit... me up with your info via e-mail on BPN, and I'll hit you back.

This is TOO crazy---lol
+++sjh
Bishop Nesby, I am also in Mississippi. What is the name and location of your church, I will plan a visit.

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