KANSAS CITY, Mo. (MBTS) – From church governance to cultural engagement, the Spring 2024 edition of the Midwestern Journal of Theology addresses several relevant questions for the Church today. The new edition features contributions from scholars and pastors including Midwestern Seminary faculty and doctoral students.
“I want to congratulate Drs. Michael McMullen and Blake Hearson for putting together another great edition of the Midwestern Journal of Theology,” said President Jason Allen. “With every edition of the MJT that we produce, I am reminded anew that scholarship should primarily serve the Church. And, as you’ll see in the articles and book reviews in this recent edition, that is precisely what has been accomplished.”
Michael McMullen, who serves as editor of the MJT and professor of Church history at Midwestern Seminary, shared, “I am very encouraged to be able to bring this issue to print, as it really is a vehicle to showcase some of the wonderful research and teaching that happens on a daily basis here at Midwestern.”
He went on to say, “The articles we publish do not come from professors in ivory towers, but from scholar-practitioners, those who write, teach, preach, pastor, and evangelize for the Church.”
The Midwestern Journal of Theology is a scholarly publication of Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. With two editions published each year, the MJT focuses on equipping the Church for global discipleship.
The new edition opens with the Spring 2024 faculty address given at Midwestern Seminary by Rustin Umstattd, assistant dean of Doctoral Studies and professor of theology and ministry.
In his article, Umstattd notes several pastoral concerns raised by evangelistic presentations that fail to prescribe baptism. He argues, “Baptism should be included in the evangelistic presentation as the prescribed manner for a person to confess faith in Christ by calling on the name of the Lord.”
Jason S. DeRouchie, research professor of Old Testament and biblical theology at Midwestern Seminary, contributed the second article. DeRouchie’s article proposes a new understanding of Zephaniah’s structure to serve preachers in communicating the prophet’s message.
DeRouchie shows how other proposed structures fail to convey Zephaniah’s message because they lack sufficient attention “to the grammatical and rhetorical signals” in Zephaniah’s argument. By applying such attention to Zephaniah, DeRouchie’s proposal reveals how the book extends an invitation to salvation.
In the third article, Joe M. Allen III offers valuable insight for missionaries to Muslim contexts, showing how biblical doctrine strengthens the faith of believers facing pressure from Islam.
Joe Allen, who serves as professor of missions at Midwestern Seminary, analyzes the factors that contributed to the rise of Islam in historically Christian areas in the Middle East, concluding, “Only those communities with an indigenous Bible and a Trinitarian theology showed any possibility of survival.”
Midwestern Seminary Professor of Ethics J. Alan Branch contributed the fourth article, titled “Developmental Personhood: A Critique of Secular Bioethics’ Major Premise.” Branch’s article contrasts the Christian belief in the image of God with the secular view that personhood is separate from human life.
Because the image of God belongs to all human beings and does not develop or wane, Branch argues, “Conception and natural death are the only non-arbitrary points to demarcate when humans should be protected.”
The fifth article comes from Taylor Lassiter, Midwestern Seminary doctoral student and senior pastor of College Heights Baptist Church in Plainview, Tx. Lassiter’s article, “‘First Among Equals’? Examining the Role of ‘Senior Pastor’ within Plurality Eldership,” addresses whether designating one elder as “Senior Pastor” among multiple elders is a biblical practice.
Drawing from 1 Timothy 5:17, Lassiter concludes, “The church is best served by the presence among the elder team of a man who is a ‘first among equals,’ tasked with wholehearted devotion to proclaiming the Scriptures.” He adds, “What he is called to do is of first importance, and the success of the church is dependent upon his faithfulness.”
In the final article, Peter Goeman, associate professor of Old Testament and biblical languages at Shepherds Theological Seminary in Cary, N.C., evaluates faith as the key issue in the debate between infant and believer’s baptism.
Goeman presents evidence to argue that faith is inseparable from the New Testament’s picture of baptism, and he analyzes what led to the separation of faith and baptism for many groups during the Reformation. Goeman’s evidence mounts a biblical defense of the Baptist distinctive of credobaptism, and he concludes, “Following the biblical model, the modern church should seek to practice baptism by recognizing that the faith of the disciple is central to the whole process.”
Following the articles, the new edition includes 11 reviews of recent books on topics including biblical theology, faith and science, and women in ministry. Doctoral students at Midwestern Seminary contributed many of these reviews.
The Midwestern Journal of Theology is available in print format for subscribers. To subscribe, contact the Academic Office at (816) 414-3745 or as@mbts.edu.
To view the issue in its entirety for free online, visit mbts.edu/journal.