Joel Treick
M.Div.
Class of 2007
I will never forget my first day at WSC. I had arrived a bit early for my first Summer Greek class and was standing outside the classroom waiting for the professor to arrive. I had been married for a grand total of 10 days. I had just moved from New York City, and was getting used to life without cabs, subways, or the phrase "fuggedaboudit." I believe I knew the Greek alphabet, and had even gone so far as to purchase a Greek New Testament, but that was about the extent of my preparation for what would await me in my first seminary class. My internal monologue that fine summer morning went a little like this: "I can't believe I'm married! I can't believe I'm going to seminary! I can't believe I'm living in California and driving a car again! I can't believe that in a couple of months I'll be able to read this entire Greek Bible!" (Even in incredulity, I'm a bit of an optimist.)
I looked up and saw that another student had also approached the door to classroom
five. His name was Clay Werner, a young single guy from Indiana who was a prodigious reader of theology and a fearless whitewater rafting guide. On the surface we seemed quite different. He liked the banjo; I liked jazz. He enjoyed risking life and limb in the mountains of Colorado; I enjoyed risking life and limb walking down any street in the Bronx after sundown. Somehow we both ended up at Westminster Seminary California. Maybe we weren't that different after all.
As I reflect on my time at WSC, I continue to be amazed at how much God has molded and changed me. Maybe that's why that first day is so vivid in my memory. I look back and see myself as that terrified 20-something kid and barely recognize him! Just the outward changes are astonishing. I've now been married for almost four years (I know, I know... barely a blip on the radar, but compared to TEN DAYS, it feels positively Methuselah-esque!). I have a baby daughter. I'm now in my 30's. Thanks in part to the thousands of pages of theology I've read in the last four years, I now wear glasses. Oh, and that young single guy named Clay? He's married and has a baby son.
Our families have become close friends. (And though neither of us is in favor of arranged marriages per se, let's just say we're not entirely opposed to the idea of our children spending a lot of time together.) Did I mention we're both going to be assistant pastors in the PCA? That we're both going to be living in Chattanooga, TN? That we're both going to be assistant pastors at the SAME church? I can only smile as I remember that God is in the habit of giving us far more than we could ever ask or imagine!
But as amazing as those outward changes are, they pale in comparison with what the Lord has done in my heart through the teaching I received at WSC. I learned why prayer is so important. I learned to understand and love the Church. I learned how to read the Bible as the one story of God's redemption of his people. I learned how to preach Christ faithfully in various genres of biblical literature. I learned to read the Bible in the original languages and was taught how to exegete it with care for the text and for God's people to whom it was given. I learned to engage thinkers, past and present, finding the answers to their longing questions at the foot of the cross. I learned to love the Holy Spirit who leads me to the cross through the word, sacraments, and prayer.
I came to seminary with passion for God, but I left with a deeper relationship with Him. I am more in awe of the truth that God's thoughts are not my thoughts, nor are his ways my ways, "as the heavens are higher than the earth," so high are his ways and thoughts above my own (Is. 55:8-9). I am also more in awe of the beloved truth that "God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life." (John 3:16) What a God we serve! He is our creator, our Mediator, and our sustainer. The Westminster Shorter Catechism begins with the well-known answer, "Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever," but then follows that up with a lesser-known answer: "The word of God, which is contained in the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him." Westminster California taught me the word of God, and in so doing taught me how to do what I was created to do and be who I was created to be. For that, I am forever grateful.
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Clay Werner
M.Div.
Class of 2007
"Beyond Belief" is how the San Diego Tribune described how I began my seminary career in the fall of 2003. What was "Beyond Belief" was how much devastation the worst wildfires in California history caused: hundreds of thousands of acres burned, and many lives lost. The end of my seminary career is marked with another tragedy: "32 Shot Dead in Virginia; Worst U.S. Gun Rampage" says the New York Times. Just another reminder of what the Book of Ecclesiastes states: "vanity of vanities." In such a world marred by the fallout from Genesis 3, one wonders if there is hope at all.
I remember when I first began looking at Westminster Seminary California. The moment that clinched it for me was watching Dr. Godfrey on the video they sent out and he stated: "When you graduate from here, you will know the Gospel." That is a more pregnant statement than some may realize. There is hope in a world like this. At Westminster California we have been taught the hope of the one grand, uniting story of all of Scripture: Christ's passionate pursuit for his people. We've been taught how to read this story, which sets the heart ablaze, from the original languages. In our OT and NT courses we've learned to read covenantally, always having Christ at the center. In the Practical Theology courses we've learned not only how to proclaim this hope-giving Gospel (or to be "Knights of the Pulpit" as Dr. Estelle frequently says) but also to minister it to the lives of God's people. In the Historical Theology courses we've learned how this Gospel has gone forth into the world, how it has been studied, muddied, reclaimed, and proclaimed.
Other things I will remember from my time here will be when Eric Landry, Dr. Julius Kim, and Dr. Horton all came out to go rafting with me in Colorado. I remember, at one point, Dr. Horton flying in the air right after we had slammed against a huge boulder. While Dr. Horton was flying like Superman
through the cool, crisp Colorado air, I could only remember Dr. Godfrey's warning to me before I left for the trip: "You don't want to know what I will do if you let anything happen to Dr. Horton." I am amazed he's actually letting me graduate. And Dr. Horton
- keep the paddle in the water!
My wife and son (Liz and Isaac) have put me through seminary. Without them and their continual support and encouragement I would not be graduating. My greatest memories are of looking out the classroom window and seeing them playing in the lawn here. They also
have experienced the love and warmth of the community here at Westminster California.
I will graduate here and leave to be a pastor of 1st Presbyterian (PCA) in Chattanooga, TN alongside one of my best friends, Joel Treick and his family. They saw me go from single man, to married man, and then to father while I've been here. They've been with us every inch of the way. The Lord has been so good to us both. In the midst of a world full of vanity and sorrow, we have been equipped here at Westminster California to proclaim the sure hope and inexpressible joy of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
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