Because the church needs ETEQ!

The church’s mission is to train a nation of disciples (learners) who not only publicly declare their faith in Christ by being baptised, but who are also equipped to understand and observe the teachings of Jesus and can apply them in 2017. None of this is easy. It wasn’t easy during the era of the first disciples and it isn’t today. We, the church, need to work at it intentionally and thoughtfully. We need to study and re-examine what it means in 2017 to “follow Me”. The same Scriptures that guided us in times past guide us today, the same Holy Spirit walks with us, instructs us and empowers us, the same church that existed in the era of the Acts of the Apostles invites us to live out this teaching in community. Yet each generation of disciples must take up the torch and equip itself: by studying the Scriptures, by re-examining and at times adapting our understanding of Scriptures, by looking closely at the culture in which we live and our area of involvement and to systematically and consistently challenge the church to be accountable to God’s calling. The church is called to profess its faith in Christ in this world with discernment and clarity.
            
The local church cannot do this job alone. It needs to mobilize men and women theologically within the churches of its respective spiritual tradition to stimulate thinking and inspire decision-making regarding its mission. One way to accomplish this is to establish schools of theology such as ETEQ. For ETEQ, this pooling of human resources for the purpose of training involves two church families of different affiliations and a faculty that represents a dozen evangelical denominations. It has a professorial team of rare quality: highly trained theologians who are also practitionners, involved in church life and mission. Needless to say, the evangelical diversity found in our student community is greater still. The church sends lay people, thinkers and doers. By allowing them to sit in the same classroom, the church ensures that leaders, both men and women, are being trained for this present generation. More than ever, a school like ETEQ is crucial. The school acts as an “agitator” and a “stimulator” of faith and culture so that the lordship of Christ can give meaning to life today and for eternity.

I challenge you to make ETEQ a partner in your mission:

-    to give ETEQ the best potential Kingdom builders you have and to ask the best of ETEQ;

-    to include ETEQ in your church development plan just as ETEQ would like to include you in its mission; 

-    to regularly support the school with your prayers and your gifts and ensure all aspects of its health; 

-    and above all, to send your best young men and women, daring to believe that God will turn them into leaders and lay workers for Him today and in the future.
   
Within a month, a new school year begins. In prayer, roughly 85–90 students in Montreal, Quebec City and all over the province will commit themselves to study, read, debate, write or dream of a church that is bolder and better equipped. Why not choose to support a student or two during this year through prayer, words of encouragement, financial support or visits to the school? There is no better way to show that you believe the work done through l’École de théologie évangélique du Québec is important than by offering your support to its students. The church needs ETEQ and ETEQ and its students need the church.

Jean Martin, Ph. D.