The Lord be with you! Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, friends of LCC, students and parents, and distinguished guests. Thank you for joining us here today at this unique presidential inauguration. Unique, because it’s the first for Luther Classical College. Unique, because we aren’t teaching any classes (we don’t open our doors until 2025). It’s also unique because it’s, well, brand new. When was the last time you heard about the construction of a new college? Actually, with a college closing every week, who needs a new one, and why would anyone even dare to start one? And in Casper, Wyoming, of all places? Before I moved here from Africa, I had to find this place on a map.
Because of all these valid questions, we at LCC have become the talk of the town. But we’re not just drawing a great deal of attention. We’re also generating a lot of attraction. So what’s the appeal? The incredible interest and support in and for this school from all over America demonstrates that we are meeting a genuine and unique need. And what is it that we are doing new?
Nothing.
Nothing?
Nothing.
Well, nothing really new when it comes to the history of education, prior to, say, a couple of hundred years ago. Unfortunately, the state of classical and Biblically-grounded post-secondary education can be likened to a buried, hidden treasure. We at LCC are rediscovering, resurrecting, and celebrating this marvelous possession of the Church, as expressed in our mission statement: “Luther Classical College educates Lutherans in the classical, Lutheran tradition and prepares them for godly vocations within family, church, and society, fostering Christian culture through study of the best of our Western heritage.” Since we are a confessionally Lutheran classical college, we are a one-of-a-kind American college.
Although many methods of education compete for attention these days, the number of people of all ages who are convinced of the superior merits of the classical model and the necessity of restoring this requisite treasure to our youth is growing exponentially.
Now, usually the inauguration of a new president follows the departure of another. The baton, or in this case, the coin, is passed on, symbolizing that the new president now builds off of the legacy of others before him. But I don’t have that luxury. Or do I? This school would not have been possible without the devotion of Christian families who identified an essential need in education years ago.
Immeasurable time and energy have already been invested into building this new college. I don’t even get to set the tone. Thanks be to God that a beautiful song was composed well before I arrived. I get to tap into heavenly sounds that already flow from every chamber of the life of this college, namely from the symphony of leaders, patrons, faculty, staff, and supporting congregations. Yet, even they can’t take the credit. They echo the masterful music from an orchestra stretching far back into the depths of Western civilization. For not only are the strongest schools a product of collaborative efforts, but a classical school’s strength is that it isn’t really doing anything new. It’s not claiming to sing a new song. Our mission is simple. Our vision is clear. Neither is new. Today’s conference program, like many of our promotional materials, simply states: “Lutheran, Classical, Conservative”.
And this lack of newness, lack of creativity, lack of imagination, is what parents and their children are realizing is key to wholesome, godly, and commonsense education. Just as the Gospel of Jesus Christ’s atoning death for us sinners is timeless, and just as the true catholic and apostolic Church rejects anything novel when it comes to doctrine, so too the foundation of a good, solid Christian education is as old as the Holy Scriptures themselves. There’s no room for postmodernity nor her offspring–such as situational ethics, cultural relativism, and Critical Theory–within the orthodox, Christian perspective. Competing worldviews cannot be grafted together.
There’s a difference, then, between education models that teach clear reasoning, like ours will, and those that encourage a second guessing of Christian truth, scientific realities, and logical patterns of thinking. When freedom of thought within the Liberal Arts happens outside of the parameters of Holy Writ, it becomes a false god, and one that undermines the very foundation upon which it stands.
At LCC, our students will be surrounded by colleagues and professors who support the moral values, worship practices, and belief system passed on to them by their pious parents and pastors. They won’t be tempted to doubt basic truths that have stood the test of time, or facts supported by true science and real history. They won’t be gulled into embracing the preposterous ideas fed to us by an increasingly irrational, secularized, anti-Christian, and highly-politicized culture, driven by pressure groups with such blatant and deplorable leftist agendas. Our graduates won’t become the casualties of the spiritual war in which every honest Christian engages. With up to 80% of Christian youth losing their faith in college (a staggering statistic!), parents of LCC students can be assured that we are reinforcing what they have taught in their homes and what their pastors have taught in their congregations.
To reiterate, we don’t see ourselves as teaching or doing anything new. Classical, Lutheran education was the norm back in the day. So if we can’t demonstrate continuity with the Church and her heritage through our pedagogy, curriculum, and presuppositions and, thus, prove a lack of newness, our efforts are a waste of time.
So it comes as no surprise that students are eager for us to open our doors. Gap-year students have paid enrollment deposits ASAP in order to guarantee their place. One third of our targeted first year student body has already been accepted during priority admissions, 46 weeks before our start date, exceeding all expectations. Potential faculty are applying for positions that have not yet been posted. Supporting congregations are waiting in line for on-site visits. Donors continue to inquire as to how they can pitch in to the project.
But if you were to take a walk to our new site, you wouldn’t see much. Nothing glorious. No buildings…yet. We don’t have anything visible of which to boast. Yet the absence of eye candy hasn’t diminished the appetite, nor deterred attraction to our menu, for our highly impressive curriculum is sure to become a gold standard in Academia. Our exceptional professors have already proven themselves to be world class.
But honestly, (just between us), sometimes the day to day feels like Noah building an ark, and praying that God will provide the livestock! Not that we are expecting a massive flood, but that it’s a daunting project, and requires a lot of faith. Yet when you believe that it’s not the vision or mission of any one person or even a community, but that of the almighty Lord Himself, you don’t just cross your fingers in desperate hope for success. You approach the work with full confidence that this is the Lord’s labour, as “faith is the certainty of things hoped for, a proof of things not seen,” (Heb. 11:1)
We are small and want to keep it that way. Our size allows for affordable tuition, but, more importantly, for a healthy and effective teaching environment, where students have comfortable access to their instructors. Small student-to-professor ratio ensures that trusting relationships are nurtured, which underscore student development; whether the young person is an extrovert or an introvert, man or woman, previously classically schooled or not. Our smallness offers an invaluable opportunity to instill within students the priority of Christian marriage, family, and piety, through both instruction and the virtuous examples of faculty, staff, and administrators, who personally cherish the Western corpus of literature, liturgy, hymnody, and heritage, as well as the Gospel message of salvation in Jesus Christ.
Our size means we are not trying to do a lot, but rather to do a few things well: forming church musicians, parochial school teachers, preparing men for seminaries, equipping moms and dads for wholesome family life. Our General B.A. furnishes everyone with leadership skills within their various vocations. Our A.A. merges two traditions of excellence: a Liberal Arts education and a practical trade, through agreements with trade schools like Tarkio Technology Institute or Casper College. A young man can become a plumber while also studying philosophy. After all, classical conservative Christian education is essential for sharpening thinking skills, interpersonal skills, and communicative skills that every individual–regardless of career goals, sex, or age–needs in order to succeed and survive in today’s complex world.
With classical education already cultivating an ambiance conducive to the holistic formation of the body, mind, and soul, our smallness allows us to have effective oversight of students. In fact, the building of edifying relationships between students and others occurs within the wider spiritual family of the Church. LCC is blessed by the relationship with the local Confessional Lutheran churches of Casper and the wider Wyoming community, who continue to serve as seeds of this grassroots school. The faithful members of Mount Hope and Trinity will grow into the mentors and the spiritual fathers and mothers of the children entrusted to our care from families across North America.
Immediately after this historic inauguration ceremony follows an ancient Vespers. When our planning committee discussed this transition, we considered how best to demarcate the academic components from the religious elements of this service, so as not to confuse any of the attendees. We found that we couldn’t. Though they are theoretically two separate services, you can’t help noticing the obvious overlap. And frankly, that’s the way it ought to be. Make a quick examination of the history underlying the academic traditions, and see how there are Christian fingerprints all over the place. The oldest colleges and universities of this blessed Republic were founded by the Church. The founding fathers of America believed that if establishing churches was the number one priority, schools were the second.
Today, secular colleges and universities deliberately want to erase all traces of religion, but it is so they are so deeply embedded within education models of the West, that it’s next to impossible. We Christians pray that the divine signature remains preserved on every page of human existence. God is both God of the religious and “secular” spheres of life. Similar to how the divine liturgy is an overlap of heaven and earth, as angels and archangels join us in our Sunday worship–or, rather shall we say, that we join them in an unending hymn that stretches into eternity–so too, education best serves its own purposes when it highlights its dependence upon heavenly truths and realities. In other words, when it doesn’t just tolerate the Word of God, but is rooted in and stems from it.
Good education is, after all, about transmitting a God-pleasing culture, in both content and form. So our mission seeks to transmit the greatest insights of the Western liberal arts tradition and Christian wisdom to the next generation. The Church’s succession plan anticipates that our youth will be strengthened as confessors of the Faith, with the ability boldly to make a defense to all who ask a reason for the hope that is in them, and other means of spreading Christ’s Gospel in word and deed. It’s in all of our interests that we don’t deprive children of what we owe them, as children of God purchased and won by our Lord’s holy precious blood and his innocent suffering and death. As Holy Scripture says, “[That] which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us. We will not hide them from their children, shewing them to the generation to come the praises of the Lord, and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done,” (Psalm 78;3-4)
Dr. Martin Luther once said: “I greatly fear that the universities, unless they teach the Holy Scriptures diligently and impress them on the young students, are wide gates to hell.” Education can function as a beloved gift of God or a detestable god of man. We at LCC are not here to make students richer, or even to ensure that they successfully achieve their esteemed career goals. We aim to make men and women better lovers and worshippers of God and servants of man. It’s never about self-service. Any earthly successes and wealth are only blessings when directed towards God-pleasing spiritual ends.
No wonder one of the chief founders of the LCMS, C.F.W. Walther, recognized the importance of a Christ-centered education. He writes, “The most careful cultivation of our parochial schools is and remains, after the public ministry, the chief means for our preservation and continuation.”1 Unsurprisingly, Luther articulated himself similarly hundreds of years earlier: “I would advise no one to send his child where the Holy Scriptures are not supreme. Every institution that does not unceasingly pursue the study of God’s word becomes corrupt.”2 Therefore, “The universities need a good, thorough reformation. I must say that, no matter whom it annoys.” For “nothing could be more devilish or disastrous than unreformed universities.”
Over the past four centuries, we have witnessed countless Christian institutions of higher learning drift away from their historic Christian tradition. History indicates that schools that are not intentionally anchored to biblical convictions and confessional identity will naturally drift from the Faith. As a rudder is to a ship is the Holy Scripture to a college.
During our ground-breaking ceremony a couple of months ago, a social media comment mocked, “Lutheran: they’ll probably only have one book in their library,” referring to the Holy Bible. At first I was annoyed. But then, after reflecting, I was delighted that we had already been typified as a solidly Biblical college. Of course we’ll have thousands of books in our library, but the fact that the secularists had characterized us as Christ-centered and Biblical, was a flattering compliment.
So, whether we are characterized by our uncompromising stance on, say, creation in six twenty-four hour days, our unabashedly pro-life compassion, or our unapologetic assertion that there are only two genders, we have already earned a reputation that would have made Luther and Walther proud. With courage and humility, we stand on Lutheran convictions and unwavering commitment to the inerrant Word of God as we “earnestly contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 1:3b).”
Now, I’m a newcomer to this community, having moved here about 6 months ago. When I first heard about the college, long before being considered for the position of president, I was thrilled as a father of 5 at the prospect of having my children apply to LCC, having given up on other options. In an attempt to find a way for a Canadian to move here so my kids could attend LCC, I said to my wife, Elise, “Maybe I can get a job there, cutting the grass or something”. God works in unpredictable ways. Yet they are always good, for they manifest His love.
And, I can assure you without a doubt that what drives LCC and empowers us to bear some heavy crosses, is 100% uncompromising Christ-like love: Love for children, even the preborn, to whom God expects us to transmit the best of education, in helping guide them to the hand that leads them to heaven.
Many of us didn’t have the opportunity to experience what these students will. But what parent doesn’t want to give their children something better than what they themselves received? We have youth serving this delicious meal tonight, a smoked Prime Rib Wyoming style BBQ. These youth are not just a source of cheap labour. Their service symbolizes two things:
First, that this school is theirs! The crucifer and some of the musicians are among the first admitted students, while our choir consists of future local applicants from Mount Hope Lutheran School.
Second, that they are cognizant of the sacrifices that an older generation is making for them, with full expectation that they one day will do likewise. As imitators of Christ our Lord, it is a great joy to seize the chance to mold the minds, hearts, and lives of these precious young people, the leaders of tomorrow, in church, state and home.
It’s not easy starting a new school. It’s risky. Without God, we have no hope to succeed. Thankfully, it is He who has blessed us already, in accordance with His timeless vision and mission. And our sovereign Triune Lord generously chooses to work through others in building and expanding his Kingdom. He uses you and me as His means. So, thank you for your willing instrumentality! I am grateful for the partnerships we already have with our Lutheran and Christian brethren in the Church and in academia, and for all those who have put their confidence in us by their prayerful support, financial gifts, and just good ole fashioned words of encouragement.
I am honored humbly to serve Luther Classical College, and praise God for the trust invested in me by you all, as, together, we prepare our school for whatever exciting plans our merciful heavenly Father has for our small, unoriginal and, by shallow worldly standards, an insignificant school. But for those with eyes to see, who discern the signs of the times, thanks be to God that LCC is a rock that’s making a refreshing splash in the sea of education.
May the grace of our Lord be with you always.
1 Arthur H. Drevlow, C.F.W. Walther: The American Luther, (Walther Press, 1987), p. 184
2 Martin Luther, To The Christian Nobility, AE 44, (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1966), 207.
