When I came to the Talbot School of Theology three and a half years ago, I had a clear assignment. In fact, I insisted that the announcement of my appointment include two words: enrollment turnaround. Talbot was not in crisis, but after years of gradual enrollment decline, we needed to change our trajectory. We needed to reach more students, strengthen our programs and develop sustainable ways to deliver theological education in a rapidly changing world.

I believe we have accomplished that initial turnaround. Now, I want us to continue to build on it. At our recent faculty and staff retreat at Forest Home, I shared a vision for the next chapter of Talbot. It is a vision that builds on our theological heritage, expands our geographic reach, strengthens our academic excellence, and brings us together as one school.

In this article, I want to share our vision for One Talbot, and four of the things that contribute to this vision coming to life.

1. We are conservative evangelical and broadly evangelical

Forest Home has an important place in evangelical history, so it was a fitting context to talk about our future.

In 1949, a young Billy Graham came to Forest Home at a difficult moment in his life and ministry. His friend and fellow evangelist, Charles Templeton, had raised serious questions about the reliability of Scripture. Graham had also recently experienced a disappointing evangelistic campaign in Altoona, Pennsylvania, which he described as a flop.

At Forest Home, Graham placed his Bible on a tree stump and made a decision to trust God's Word, even though he could not answer every question. That moment became a turning point in his life and ministry. Soon afterward, his Los Angeles evangelistic campaign would launch him into international prominence and more than half a century of fruitful ministry.

I love that story, because it reminds us that while our methods, structures, and institutions change, God's Word does not. So our confidence in his Word does not have to change either.

This is meaningful for Talbot, because we have changed in several ways over the decades. We now have faculty and students from a wider range of evangelical traditions. At the same time, we have not abandoned our theological commitments — we have had an unchanged doctrinal statement for over a century.

Talbot is simultaneously both conservative evangelical and broadly evangelical. We are conservative evangelical in our commitment to the authority and inerrancy of Scripture, our doctrinal standards, and our theological convictions.

We are broadly evangelical because we welcome and engage multiple traditions within our conservative commitments. Baptists, Presbyterians, Pentecostals and others can find a home at Talbot. We are looking at starting Houses of Study for those within distinctive traditions, such as the Christian and Missionary Alliance, Anglicans, Presbyterians and more.

We are not trying to become a different kind of institution. We are trying to become an even better expression of the institution God has called us to be. I believe such conviction places Talbot in a particularly important position in theological higher education.

We need institutions that combine serious scholarship, theological conviction, spiritual formation and preparation for ministry. Talbot embodies these values, such that we can and should be recognized among the leading seminaries in North America. And we’re also uniquely positioned because of our organizational structure in a university.

2. We are embedded within Biola University

At many universities, undergraduate theological education and graduate seminary education operate in separate schools. Almost everywhere that happens, it does not go well — they drift from one another.

Talbot already had that integration when I got here, and this organizational structure attracted me to this role. Our undergraduate Bible, theology and ministry programs as well as our graduate seminary programs, all belong to one school, One Talbot.

This integration matters even more as we expand geographically. Today, Talbot includes undergraduate programs that serve the broader Biola University community, graduate programs at our two campuses (La Mirada and Phoenix), extension sites (Brooklyn and Kyiv), online programs, and a growing number of Talbot Embedded locations.

So different students experience our institution in different ways. For undergraduate students, Biola University will understandably be their primary institutional identity. These students come to Biola for engineering, psychology, nursing, business, film and many other majors. And all those students are also shaped by Talbot through their required Bible, theology and ministry education.

For graduate students, on the other hand, Talbot Seminary is often their primary institutional identity. That's why we're intentionally strengthening the Talbot Seminary name while maintaining our integration with Biola University.

Different audiences may know us by different names, but internally we are one academic community. And that integration should mean something. Our faculty should collaborate across undergraduate and graduate programs. Our disciplines should work together. Our academic and administrative leadership should serve the whole school.

We have distinct responsibilities, but we share a common mission — a mission at the heart of Biola University itself.

I talk a lot about Talbot’s seminary expansion, but in the midst of that discussion, something important must always remain clear: Our undergraduate programs are essential to both Talbot specifically and Biola generally. Our undergraduate students at Biola complete the equivalent of a 30-credit Bible, theology and ministry minor.

This requirement is an extraordinary commitment, a standout among evangelical universities. We are deeply committed to this, because students studying engineering, marketing, nursing, psychology or film are also receiving substantial theological education.

In fact, about a third of the credits delivered at Biola University are Talbot School of Theology credits, most of them at the undergraduate level. And students from across the university often describe these Bible, theology and ministry classes as some of their most formative experiences at Biola. Therefore, our undergraduate faculty serve at the heart of the university's mission.

What’s more, our undergraduate Bible, Theology and Ministry majors have also grown significantly over the past several years. Our overall enrollment has grown substantially.

We need to continue all of this momentum. And we should not underestimate the contribution of the undergraduate aspect of Talbot, even when the seminary may receive more attention in some of our external marketing communications.

At the same time, undergraduate higher education is facing significant demographic and financial challenges, the infamous “demographic cliff.” So, we will work to sustain and, hopefully, grow our undergrad program.

3. We are two campuses and beyond

One of the most significant recent developments for Talbot has been the addition of our Talbot Seminary Phoenix campus. I use the language of “campus” intentionally. Phoenix is not simply an extension center. Phoenix is a second seminary campus alongside the La Mirada campus. And we intend to invest in it as such.

Right now, the La Mirada campus is substantially larger, with approximately 800 students taking at least some classes in person. This compares with fewer than 100 such students at the Phoenix campus.

That said, I believe Phoenix has extraordinary potential. Building on the wonderful legacy of Phoenix Seminary, I think Talbot Seminary Phoenix can grow to 500 or 600 students in the foreseeable future. Part of this opportunity is geographic. Phoenix is a rapidly growing metropolitan area, and students are often more willing to relocate to Phoenix than to Southern California, where the cost of living can be prohibitive.

But this growth will not happen automatically. It will require investment in faculty, staff, academic programs, fundraising and relationships with churches and ministry leaders throughout Arizona and the Southwest.

For example, I am investing substantial time being personally, physically present in Phoenix. I am meeting with pastors, speaking at conferences, building relationships with donors, and working with our team to establish Talbot as a significant theological presence in the region.

We have already announced a faculty position in Christian Ministry and Leadership in Phoenix. Just last week, we received a five-million-dollar gift to establish an endowed chair focused on cultural engagement. We are not simply putting a Talbot sign on an existing campus. We are building a genuinely two-campus seminary, and we are growing beyond even that.

We have two extension sites: New York City and Kyiv, Ukraine. Both are important, and each one serves a very different context. Our New York City extension operates in partnership with Chosen People Ministries through the Feinberg Center. It offers graduate theological education, including a significant program in Messianic Jewish studies. This is a distinctive expression of Talbot's commitment to theological education.

Our Kyiv extension is operating in the middle of a war. I have visited our students and partners in Ukraine, and I continually emphasize to our faculty and staff that these are not simply names on an enrollment report. These are our students and colleagues who are serving Christ and his church under the daily danger of Russian aggression.

We have faced difficult decisions about how and when to resume in-person education, and we must continue to prioritize the safety of our students and faculty. But we are committed to them. They are part of One Talbot, just as surely as our students in Los Angeles and Phoenix, and beyond.

Beyond that, one of the most significant initiatives we have launched since I became dean is Talbot Embedded. This is not an entirely new idea in theological education, and it is a relatively straightforward concept. Institutions such as Asbury and Dallas Theological Seminary have been using similar approaches for years.

Nevertheless, it is an important development for Talbot. Rather than requiring every student to relocate to Southern California or Phoenix, we can bring high-quality theological education closer to the churches and communities where students already live and serve. We are not interested in joining a race to the bottom and sacrificing academic rigor. Yet we are adaptive to changing realities in higher education and the culture.

Talbot Embedded uses a hybrid, modular cohort model. Students complete much of their coursework online while also gathering for in-person intensives, typically Thursday evening, Friday and Saturday. Our faculty travel to partner churches or ministry organizations to teach these intensives. This model allows students to remain connected to their churches, families and ministries while receiving a rigorous Talbot education.

We began with pilot locations in Seattle and San Diego. Since then, we have expanded or begun developing partnerships in Las Vegas, Honolulu, Los Angeles, Orange County, the Inland Empire, the Bay Area, Central California and other locations. We are also developing organizational partnerships with church networks. For example, our relationship with the Aspire Network includes a cohort of approximately 20 students.

And all of this has required reorganization of our administrative structures to distribute leadership and facilitate growth.

4. We are distributing leadership for growth

As Talbot has grown, we have also needed to reorganize our leadership. When I arrived, I was mainly focused on enrollment. Now my role is shifting toward finding new students, developing partnerships, raising financial support and mentoring our leaders.

That shift means empowering others to lead the academic and administrative work of the school. Our leadership structure now includes an academic dean, an administrative dean, associate deans responsible for major areas of the school and campus leadership in Phoenix.

We are focused on shared responsibility, clear communication and healthy organizational practices. Our reorganization should make us more effective, not more complicated. We should be the kind of school where someone can identify a problem, know who is responsible and work together to solve it.

This reorganization includes our various centers focused on the Holy Spirit, marriage and relationships, children and families, Chinese theology and other areas of research and ministry. As we reorganize, we are working to align these centers more clearly with the appropriate academic leadership, while preserving their distinct contributions.

While I was experiencing and recovering from my health crisis in the summer, I got to see the strength of this distribution of responsibility. Leaders carried the institution forward, even while I was not able to be present. That experience reinforced my belief that a healthy institution cannot depend on one person. We need strong leaders throughout the school.

I want to spend the coming years helping develop those leaders, and also gathering the resources needed to sustain our mission.

Money can be uncomfortable to discuss, and that is especially true in theological education. But we cannot fulfill our mission if we are not financially sustainable. Enrollment, tuition revenue, fundraising and endowed chairs are not the mission. But they help make the mission possible.

For example, as I have said, fundraising will become an increasingly larger part of my responsibilities. I would like to see us establish approximately five additional endowed chairs over the next several years. We also need to strengthen our advancement efforts in Phoenix and across the broader Talbot community.

Endowed faculty positions, scholarships, and donor-supported initiatives will help us build a sustainable institution that can serve students and churches for generations. Our Lilly-supported initiatives have provided important opportunities, but we must build programs that can continue beyond the life of a grant. That is a responsibility we owe to our students, faculty, donors and the church.

Conclusion: What I See in Next Several Years

I recently turned 60, and I have been thinking about what I’d like to see at Talbot over the next few years. In other words, I’m thinking about what I need to do to leave Talbot healthy when I am gone!

And when I think about what Talbot might look like ten years from now, I have a fairly clear picture.

I see a vibrant undergraduate theological education program that continues to shape the entire Biola University community theologically.

I see a strong residential seminary presence in Los Angeles.

I see Talbot Seminary Phoenix with hundreds of students and a growing influence throughout Arizona and the Southwest.

I see hundreds of additional students studying through Talbot Embedded locations across the United States. And hundreds online around the world.

I see some of those embedded sites growing into more established extension centers.

I see partnerships with churches, networks, and denominations that enable us to serve communities we have not previously reached.

I see strong faculty scholarship, rigorous academic programs, meaningful spiritual formation and growing financial sustainability.

And I see a school that has learned to function as one institution across multiple locations and expressions.

This will all require significant work. We will need to continue improving our structures, developing leaders, strengthening programs, and building relationships. We will make mistakes. We will have to adjust. Some initiatives will succeed more quickly than others.

But I believe there is real momentum. We have made important progress over the last three and a half years, and I am grateful for the faculty and staff who have made that possible. The next chapter is not simply about getting bigger. It is about becoming stronger, more effective, more sustainable and better equipped to serve the church.

We are a school with a remarkable history and an extraordinary opportunity. We have faculty who are deeply committed to scholarship and the church. We have students preparing for ministry in a changing world. We have a university whose commitment to biblical education remains central to its identity.

I am grateful for where God has brought us. And I am excited about where we are going.

One Talbot. Together, for the glory of God and the good of the church.