Berean Bible Institute Overview

[0:00] And it's good to be with you guys. It's good to fellowship. We do appreciate the fact that this church does support Berean Bible Institute.! I want to share, since it's come up a couple of different times, the differences.

[0:13] ! We don't offer liberal arts or anything like that, but it was to train pastors, missionaries, and leaders who will stand for the gospel of God's grace.

[0:41] A three-year program was started. At some point in that time, Berean Bible Society, they did not want to continue to run a school. So they said, well, we want to move you over and let you run on your own with your own board.

[0:57] And we share some board members. But we're our own school. We have our own support. I talk to people about BBI, and I go, they say, oh, we get your material.

[1:09] I say, oh, you get the searchlight. Yeah, we get the searchlight. Well, that's not us. So I'm glad you get the searchlight. But we put out something called the Berean Bible Institute Bulletin, which comes out four times a year, that tells a little bit about what's going on at the school.

[1:24] There's usually an article there and so forth. But our goal, our catchphrase is training for ministry. So the first slide up here, first PowerPoint is...

[1:37] Well, before I do that, who's been coming to this church the longest? All right. Well, you get... Don't read anything into this. This is the state and place of the dead.

[1:51] No, I'm... It's a book. Very good book, by the way. It's on our book table. Help yourself. We thank you for your... Who's second? I got another book.

[2:02] I don't know you well enough to know... Okay. This is called Unlocking the Scripture, the Key to Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth, by Dr. Bedore. Dr. Bedore was the founding president of BBI.

[2:15] But I want to... This slide up here for a reason. If I were to ask you... By the way, if you answer this correctly, pick any book off our book table.

[2:28] Can you think of a verse that talks about being surrendered to the Lord Jesus Christ? Raise your hand if you can think of a verse. I know you know the verse.

[2:41] It does not use the word surrender, by the way. That is exactly the verse I'm looking for.

[2:54] Romans 12. It talks about being a living sacrifice. Holy and acceptable to God. When I come and talk about Berean Bible Institute, and I talk about training for ministry, a lot of times people are excited about what we do.

[3:11] They believe that what we do is important, but they don't think it's necessarily for them. And it may not be. But I'll tell you this. Being surrendered in Romans chapter 12, being a living sacrifice, is not just for people who want to go into the ministry.

[3:30] Romans 12 was written for every person in the church, the body of Christ, because God puts us in places of ministry. And He gives us a sphere of people around us.

[3:41] It may be your family. I'll never meet your family. But if you know the Lord Jesus Christ is your Savior, He's got you there as a witness, as a testimony. I think of you parents or grandparents with those grandbabies running around.

[3:56] What an opportunity to breathe in them the life and truth of God's Word and God's truth. Maybe even you get the opportunity to lead one of them to Christ. What an opportunity that would be.

[4:08] So I want to just set the record straight. Surrendered living is not just for the people who want to go into ministry full time and all of that. It's for all of us. The second thing I want to talk about this is if God is leading a person into ministry.

[4:23] I see we have some young people here. And actually a lot of our students are 30, 40, 50 years old. Second career. And I'm getting ahead of myself. I'll talk about that in a second.

[4:34] But I want you to think about it in terms like this. God wants us to be prepared to serve Him wherever we're at. And people say, well, I don't know if I'm going to go in the ministry.

[4:46] I'm kind of afraid to give my life to Christ because, you know, I don't want to go to Africa and be a missionary and all this. And here's what I say to all of that. Don't you worry about it.

[4:58] Because if God is calling you into full time ministry, number one, He'll tell you. He'll let you know. And the second thing is this. And this is the neatest thing about it.

[5:10] Is He'll make you want to do it. But I have never met a pastor or missionary or someone in full time Christian work that God had not put it in their heart, the passion to do it.

[5:24] So don't worry about it if you're worried about whether surrendering my life to Christ as far as a ministry and going into ministry or mission field or anything like that. God puts it on people's hearts.

[5:36] And He moves them into ministry. That's why when you hear the missionaries that come through here or you hear people like me or other ministry leaders, we didn't go into this thinking, well, I want to do this.

[5:49] This is the best move. A lot of us, including myself, didn't even dream that we would be doing what we're doing. But God opened doors and we stepped through them. So surrendering for ministry is for everyone.

[6:02] You can go ahead and go to the next slide. Our mission, Berean Bible Institute. This is a very succinct mission.

[6:12] I've memorized it so I can tell you. To train pastors, missionaries, and Christian leaders for the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ and the proclamation of the gospel of the grace of God given to and through the Apostle Paul.

[6:30] That's our mission. That's why we exist. And I want to point out something here. It's the part where training pastors, missionaries, and Christian leaders.

[6:43] And you say, well, I'm not going to be a pastor. I'm not going to be a missionary. But that leader part. Every book I've ever read on leadership, they try to define it.

[6:55] And the most base definition of leader that I have ever seen is influence. And folks, you're leaders.

[7:06] Now, I don't know how good a leader you are because some people are bad influences, but we're all leaders in some capacity. So when I think of BBI and our mission, it is to train pastors and missionaries, but also Christian leaders for the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ.

[7:24] And I'm so blessed. Go to the next slide, if you would. The impact that BBI has had. Next year, we will be 30 years old.

[7:35] 1996 is when we started. 80% that nearest that we can tell, 80% of our students are serving in some capacity in ministry. We have people who are actively pastoring churches.

[7:49] We have people who are actively on the mission field. We have ministries like Grace Ministries International, Things to Come Mission, Word of Grace Mission, sending students to BBI to be trained.

[8:04] That's been one of the biggest blessings for us is because some of these missionary organizations, Grace Missionary Organizations, will identify leaders on the foreign field and say, this person is a leader.

[8:18] They're already serving. They need more intense, systematic Bible training We want them to go to BBI. And as long as they speak English, they can take classes at BBI unless they speak Portuguese, which leads me to something else that I'm very pleased about.

[8:35] This last part of the slide here is that about three years ago, we started Berean Bible Institute Brazil. It is fully Berean Bible Institute.

[8:50] Paul Kressmeyer is the leader of that. He is the director under us. They go through some of the same classes that we do. And Mariana, his wife, who has taken classes at different times from BBI, Paul was a graduate of BBI.

[9:07] Mariana has taken a number of classes. I've taught her a couple of classes. And they lead Berean Bible Institute Brazil, which we have about 25 students there in Portuguese.

[9:17] So listen, if you don't want to take it in English and you can speak Portuguese, knock yourself out. But I want to just talk about this a little bit because God's really blessed us.

[9:31] I'm going to tell you a little story. When I started, I was a pastor in Chicago. And Dr. Ed Bedore, who was the president of the school, called me.

[9:42] And I'd met him one time before. And he knew me through some other people who he'd talked to about. And he said, Robert, would you be interested in coming up part-time, about a two-hour drive, to teach homiletics, which is preaching, and pastoral ministry.

[10:01] Now, when I received Ed's call, I was sitting in a junior high parking lot because I was doing substitute teaching. I was a pastor, but also had to work another job.

[10:12] And listen, the opportunity... I like junior hires, by the way. I was a youth minister for years. But the idea of teaching in a seminary-type atmosphere or teaching junior hires, the junior hires had no chance.

[10:27] So I took the job as teaching part-time. Then they asked me to come on full-time. And at the time, we had no distance education.

[10:40] We had about, I think at the most at the time, 25 on-campus students at BBI. Over time, though, we did not have dorms.

[10:50] We did not cater to the 18-year-old kid looking for a degree. In the year, our attendance started to dwindle. When I became president of BBI, there were seven students.

[11:03] And I don't say that. I say that with fear and trembling because I took the job. But something that Dr. Bedore had started was a few distance study classes.

[11:17] So we recognize that face-to-face education is the best. It's better than online. It's better than any of that.

[11:27] Face-to-face is so much better. But we were running into a problem. We were going to die. And so what we went kicking and screaming to do is, and let me just say this about COVID.

[11:42] For all of the ills of COVID, COVID was the foot that kicked us into distance education. Kicking and screaming, but we went there.

[11:54] And I want to say this to you. I am so glad we did. Right now, we are almost at 100 students. We're in 13 countries. And if you speak English, you can take classes at BBI.

[12:06] And that has been such a blessing. And it's one of those things that God does where you think we got to fight for this and fight for this. And you're fighting and you're fighting and you're not winning.

[12:16] And you think, you know, we don't want to go that route. But when you pivot, when we went to distance education, it just opened the world. So when I come here and I say, hey, would you guys like to take classes at BBI?

[12:30] If it was just in Wisconsin, how many of you would want to move to Wisconsin? Here's my joke. I don't like living in Wisconsin. I'm from Alabama. That's God's country.

[12:42] So, and you guys now are going, oh, I get that accent. I can hear a little bit of something going on there. But here's the deal. Now I can go to the world and say, hey, would you like to take classes at BBI?

[12:54] And I'm so blessed because our alumni, I know you've guys had Tim board here at different times. Timothy, I call him Second Timothy. His email is Second Timothy.

[13:06] He's in a class of mine right now. So he told me to say hello to everyone here. And when they traveled to Naples, I said, you got to tell this person hello.

[13:16] And he did. So I'm paying back here. But what's encouraging to me is our leaders now, our students and graduates are sending their adult kids to BBI.

[13:30] To me, the legacy is continuing. It's not just a one and done. It's, but they see the value in encouraging their kids to take classes at BBI. So I want to just tell you about our student body right now.

[13:43] We have had, and I mentioned this earlier, we have pastors taking classes. We have missionaries taking classes. We have doctors taking classes. We have healthcare providers taking classes.

[13:56] In my class right now, I teach, I have four students. Timothy is one. He's training for ministry, taking classes like a maniac. And his brother Luke just started. He's not in my class though.

[14:07] I have an administrator in a Christian college who wants to know more about the grace message. She's taking a class from me. I have an investigator from New Jersey who's taking class.

[14:19] He's an elder in his church, probably my age, maybe a little younger, probably younger. I have a healthcare professional from Alabama. She's a respiratory therapist.

[14:30] She wants to write children's books and help ministry to children. So it just kind of shows you the different kind of people coming from different points of view.

[14:43] And that makes up our students. We have business leaders. We have, you know, working professionals, housewives. And so that's been a blessing to kind of go into a class and you have different people at different stages, but they all want to grow.

[14:58] And so if you would just go to the next one. But our goal is prepare people for ministry. And I always like to put the caveat, wherever the Lord leads you.

[15:14] Because going back to that first slide, don't do that. But that's the point. We're all to be surrendered to the Lord Jesus Christ. To be prepared to serve him wherever he leads us.

[15:26] That's the goal. And I think about this in regards to our, you know, where's God leading you? Well, I don't know that.

[15:37] Maybe I'm a Sunday school teacher. Maybe I'm a board elder. Maybe I'm, you know, a person who's just got grandchildren. Maybe I want to, God's leading me to be more prepared at work in ministry.

[15:49] We don't know that. But what we want to do as BBI is to provide a way for you to prepare and grow deeper. I want to say this because at local churches, I grew up in a local church in Mobile, Alabama.

[16:05] And I thank God for my local church. I thank God for my local church. I thank God for their stand on the gospel of the grace of God. It was a grace church. I got saved at 14 and started attending that church.

[16:18] I ended up graduating from Grace Bible College, graduating from high school, going to Grace Bible College for five years, and then on to Moody and then to a seminary, Louisiana Baptist University.

[16:29] But my local church, my local church grounded me in the truth. But one of the things that seminary Bible Institute does, if you take a class, is you get concentrated teaching on a subject that sometimes you don't get in churches because you can't hit that all the time unless your church has some type of a seminary type program or class of intense learning.

[16:57] And some do. And some do it really well. But that's where we come in. And I thank the Lord for God using BBI in that regard.

[17:08] One of the things that I'll just announce, and I maybe shouldn't do this, but I will because it'll keep me on track, is we offer certificate programs called, a couple of them, I know I brought it up here, a certificate in dispensational studies and a certificate in biblical worldview, two different certificates.

[17:37] They're 10 credit hours each. And we are going to add a third, hopefully, at the first of the year. And that's a certificate in women's ministry, where we are looking to, in fact, I've got a meeting with about five or six ladies who are leaders in the area who already do women's ministry to help us define our curriculum for that, to empower women and train women to reach women for Christ and to disciple women in the church.

[18:07] So that's something that we're looking at. And you can, when you think about that, pray for us, because we believe that is very important to our ministry, not only to just train individuals to serve the Lord.

[18:20] You can go to the next slide, if you would. We offer classes in two different ways. We offer classes. We don't have any on campus anymore.

[18:31] As I said, we were not able to do it. I had students, when we started going online and in distance education, I had students who were working all day, full time, tell me, Dr. Nix, I would rather sit at home and take that class online than come to BBI and I live five miles away because I can do that and you offer it, so can I take it?

[19:06] And that's one of the things, when we went distance, we had to bite the bullet and say, yes, it's open to anyone. So at some point, at one point after when COVID, my last on-campus class was right when COVID started, we just decided to say, we're going to embrace it and move forward.

[19:24] And as I said earlier before, God's really, really blessed that. So the way we offer classes on the thing here, virtual instructor-led format. Here's how this looks.

[19:35] You take a class. We have classes that run eight weeks and 16 weeks. Most of our classes run eight weeks. But a class like homiletics is 16 weeks.

[19:49] I'm teaching right now an exposition of Paul's epistles. 13 of these epistles you can't do in eight weeks. That would kill me and them. So we're doing that in 16 weeks.

[20:00] But most of our classes are eight weeks long. You would log in on, say, a night, Tuesday night, from 6.15 to 8 o'clock. And you would be there with an instructor.

[20:13] All your classmates, we use Zoom. We found that to be the most reliable for us. And you have a class. The teacher has a PowerPoint typically working with it, question and answers.

[20:24] And then you have out-of-class work. You have to read. You have to prepare. You have to write. There are tests. And that's how the virtual classes go as far as online.

[20:37] Then we do something called self-directed. The virtual classes are only fall two sections, two eight-week sessions in the fall and two eight-week sessions in the spring.

[20:51] But the self-directed, which is the bottom bullet there, can be started any time. They all run 16 weeks.

[21:02] So you say, you know, I don't want to try that eight-week thing. That's tough. And eight weeks is tough. A lot of work. But 16 weeks, you can take the same class that was offered eight weeks in 16 weeks.

[21:13] And then you have once-a-month turn-ins. And we have instructors, not only at BBI in our office, but we have key instructors all over the country who would be your advisor, grade your papers, and you would connect with them as an instructor.

[21:30] You have a question, just ask them or call them. And so that's how a self-directed class, you can go ahead and advance it, is done. Our ultimate goal is transformation.

[21:45] Our ultimate goal is to challenge students, our students to grow. And I will say this as the president. We do offer, we offer degrees.

[21:56] We offer an associate degree in biblical studies, which is 60 hours from BBI. We offer an associate's degree in biblical foundations, where if you want to transfer in, or you already have a degree, you can transfer in 30 hours, take 30 hours from us, and get an associate's in biblical foundations.

[22:22] Or we offer a bachelor in ministries. And why am I telling you all of this is our goal is to simply prepare people for ministry.

[22:36] And God opens those opportunities. And so we offer those ways that people can grow, people can have a program that they're working toward.

[22:47] And that's been such a blessing. I lost my train of thought here. I was going somewhere with that. Not that that's not important. But the whole goal here is to understand and to grow deeper in what God is calling us to do.

[23:00] So I'll come back to it at some point. You can go to the next one. I jumped ahead of myself, but to prepare for more effective ministry right where you are as you serve in the local church.

[23:14] We want to, when I open my Bible, I don't see BBI anywhere. I don't see us there.

[23:27] But you know what I do see? The local church. And the local church is essential and important. You being here this morning is very important. You, the people who come, you and others who will come for Sunday morning is so important because we need each other.

[23:43] We need the support of the body of Christ. And BBI, while we are not mentioned in the Bible like the local church, our founding was to come alongside and encourage and help the local church and provide alternate ways of training and leadership for the local church.

[24:03] So that's kind of, when we talk about serving, I go back to this idea that, that I don't know what God's leading in your life. I do know this though.

[24:15] God's got a purpose for you. I don't care how old you are. He's got a purpose for you. He didn't just create you to not have a purpose. In fact, we'll talk a little bit about this in our Sunday morning service.

[24:27] But he's given us a purpose. He's given us a message. He's given us a savior that the world needs to hear. You can go to the next one if you would. One of the passions for Berean Bible Institute is making an impact today.

[24:47] But also for generations to come. I just turned 60 years old.

[24:58] For some of you, that's old. For some of you, that's young. For me, that's very sobering. But I look at this and I think, well, what about BBI in 20 years?

[25:12] I won't be a part of it. But I want BBI to be here for eternity or into the future as the Lord leads until the rapture.

[25:24] And when I think about that, I think future generations. As I said before, we have our graduates from years past having their adult kids taking classes at BBI.

[25:34] And I just thank the Lord that God uses BBI in such a way and to empower and to train and to encourage.

[25:47] And that's been a blessing to me to see that because of God using our students and our graduates. We have graduates, as I said, in 13 different countries and pastoring churches and different things like that.

[26:02] When I, oh, I know where I was going before. Or I'm circling back. But when I, as a president, get a degree or a diploma that comes across my desk, I may not know that student very well.

[26:16] I don't know all of our students. But when I sign it as the president and our academic dean signs it, their degree or their diploma, I know what they've gotten.

[26:28] I know what they've been trained in. And I know what our curriculum is. And we want to make sure that we're sending students out prepared for ministry. And back to this generational issue that God would continue to use us to reach people who will reach people.

[26:47] Paul said, the things that you've heard from me, Timothy, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. 2 Timothy 2. We'll talk about that in our service here.

[26:58] But can you imagine that? You're here this morning. You're here this morning, and so am I, because of 2 Timothy 2, 1 and 2. Do you realize that?

[27:09] When Paul told Timothy, you guys are getting a sneak preview of the sermon. But when Paul told Timothy, Timothy, be strong in the grace that's in Christ Jesus and the things which you've heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.

[27:24] Do you realize when he told Timothy that and Timothy honored God by that life, you and I are part of that chain? You and I are part of that chain. And I'm not saying that the person who led you to Christ was perfect.

[27:37] My stepbrother led me to Christ. And he certainly wasn't perfect. I don't think he finished well. He walked away from the Lord. But the time he led me to Christ, I came to the Lord.

[27:49] And I've led people to the Lord. So that continues to go, that leading future generations. You can go to the next one there. Here's the ask.

[27:59] And here's something that I want to challenge you with. Berean Bible Institute charges tuition. We charge $100 a credit hour.

[28:12] But our students pay just a small part of what it takes to run an institute. When I was at Grace Bible College, I went there for five years, graduated with a bachelor in theology, their pastoral program.

[28:28] Somebody told me that as a student at Grace Bible College, we only paid a third of what it actually cost to run a school.

[28:40] And I didn't think about it. I was a kid, 22 years old. I didn't care. As the president of BBI, I know exactly what they're saying. Because BBI, we operate based on the gifts from churches, the gifts from individuals who believe in our ministry and want to see it continue.

[29:01] So with this, I'm going to ask you to prayerfully consider supporting BBI financially. And I want you to pray about that. I don't think everybody in here should or needs to.

[29:14] I think God lays it on our hearts to support different ministries. By the way, I'm getting off now. I love to talk about giving because nobody talks about it.

[29:29] And I don't know this church well enough to have gotten into Paul in 2 Corinthians 8 and 9, which are tremendous on Christians giving. to quote Charles Stanley.

[29:40] Anybody know who he is or who was? God did not create us to be reservoirs. He created us to be channels. Great comment. But here's what I'll say.

[29:51] I believe if you attend this church, you need to support this church financially. Absolutely. You need to support this church financially. But God lays it on our hearts at different times when a missionary comes through, a ministry comes through, and one ministry resonates with you, and God leads you to support, you support, you follow through.

[30:15] And some missionaries come through, some organizations come through, and you're not, you don't believe that God's leading you to do that. See, that's the beauty of it. God works on our hearts.

[30:27] And so I'm just asking you from Berean Bible Institute, if God is leading you to do that, thank you. We praise the Lord for that, but consider it. Because ministries like BBI, BBS, all others, missionaries that are on the field, would not be there were it not for people like me or you.

[30:49] And I pointed to me because I give to missions, and I give to BBI. I am part of the body of Christ who is to be a channel.

[31:00] It's not just me asking you, I'm a giver as well, and my wife and I give. But, here's the beautiful point of this. Take your Bibles and turn to Philippians 4.

[31:11] I was in a missions conference at BBI, or we held a missions conference, Philippians chapter 4, and Tim Heath, does anybody know Tim Heath, who used to be with Things to Come Mission?

[31:24] He was their developmental guy. Anyway, he's preaching a message, and he was part of our missions conference, and he read this verse, and it was like a eureka moment for me.

[31:37] Tim was preaching, and if you know the Philippian letter, the Philippian church supported Paul. They were a giving church.

[31:50] They weren't a rich church, but they were a giving church. They sent Epaphroditus about 750 miles to Rome to support Paul while he was under house arrest. But in verse 17, Paul says something to them.

[32:07] He says, Not that I seek the gift, but I seek the fruit that abounds to your account. Now, that's the only verse I want you to look at there.

[32:21] I'm sitting there in that missions conference that we were holding. Tim was speaking. That verse made a connection for me. And here's the way it made a connection for me.

[32:35] Maybe for you too, and probably you already know all this stuff, and I'll tell you, or have been telling you. He says, Not that I seek the gift. He was, he needed the gift, and he was getting support by them, and he was thanking them for that support.

[32:50] But the second part of that verse says, But I speak, but I seek the fruit that abounds to your account. And the connection here is this.

[33:02] I'll use Linda and I as an example. We support a missionary, or missionaries. And we give X amount a month.

[33:14] None of your business, what we give. None of my business, what you give. But we give. What that verse teaches me is this. I'm not going to go to Indonesia.

[33:28] At least I don't know I am. I don't think so. I think I'm where God wants me to, at least today. But when we give that support to that missionary, and that missionary does whatever they do, lead someone to Christ, Christ, I am a part of that.

[33:49] I have partnered with them. And I support them. We support them. So that when they do the work that we have supported them to do, Paul says, not that I seek the gift, but I seek the fruit that abounds to your account.

[34:07] The Philippians were a part of that ministry. So when they supported Paul, they supported his ministry. So we think about it, when Paul is there in Rome, and he leads Onesimus to Christ, Philemon, the book of Philemon, when he leads Onesimus to Christ, the church there in the Philippian church, not the Filipino church, but the Philippian church, were part of his ministry.

[34:30] And that's the beauty of the body of Christ. So I want to encourage you. I believe this. We'll say it without apology. Pastor, I don't know him very well. He never told me anything. Need to support this church financially.

[34:41] 100%. But if God is laying it on your heart to support other ministries, follow through. Because we partner with those ministries to carry out the work that we probably would never go and do, but God lays it on our heart, and we believe in what's going on there.

[35:02] And that may be BBI. It may be a missionary. It may be BBS. It may be someone else. But follow through with God's leading in your life. He's never called us to be reservoirs.

[35:15] He's called us and He's given us resources for the ministry. And that's where I'll, I'll just end it there. I got one more slide, but it's not.

[35:26] But anybody have any questions for me about Berean Bible Institute? Thank you guys for the opportunity to be here.

[35:45] And I would have never, ever dreamed that I would be in the role at the school. I wasn't planning on it. And God opened that door and we stepped through it.

[35:56] But, yes, sir. Why did the Berean Bible Society actually decide to separate? I find that distance.

[36:08] Separate from? From you. Oh, no. It was not anything like that. In fact, we're very close. It was them as a society who's, you know, they're a literature ministry with books and everything.

[36:24] That was their focus. And Paul Sadler was the president at the time. And Paul taught at BBI for years after. After the move.

[36:35] But it wasn't a, it wasn't a negative thing at all. It was them saying, look, we have this, we have this, we've started, we've birthed the school. We're we, but we don't want to, to oversee it in that sense.

[36:46] And so when BBI was, it moved to its own organization under its own president, BBS called Ed Bedore to be the president.

[36:57] And we shared and still share two board members from the, from the society. So it wasn't like we're kicking you out. We don't want anything to do with you. It's we don't believe that our mission is a literature ministry and that's our focus.

[37:15] We want this to go forward. And we want to share board members, but we're going to let you go and do your own thing or be your own entity. Do you know who Kevin Sadler is, by the way, when I say that?

[37:28] He's a friend. We attend church together. We went out to dinner with him the other night. There's a really good relationship, but it's a different ministry, different organization, different goals. So, but not in an adverse way at all.

[37:41] Yeah. How many different instructors do you have? I've met some of them. Yep. On campus, I've got, including myself, four.

[37:53] And then we have, I think in all, probably six or seven more. And one of the, one of the neat things about this is that we can have an instructor who is pastoring a church in, say, Oklahoma.

[38:09] Oklahoma. And, and he operates, he works for us as far as a distance study instructor. And they're paid. They, you know, they clock in their hours that they work and working with our students as part of, it's, it's a position that's paid, hourly position.

[38:24] And, but we have about 10 or 11 right now that are working with us. Not, and that's in America, not including, let me just say this about Brazil, not including Brazil because Brazil is self-sustaining.

[38:37] We charge the Brazilians to take classes, but the money goes back into Brazil to pay instructors in Brazil. So, that's been a real neat thing for us. Yes, sir?

[38:48] And you said that you were 100% remote, but then you just got on campus and got four instructions. Oh, we, in our offices. We don't have students on campus, but in our offices I've got a, I've got a, I've got, on our campus I've got Dan Walgas who's our dean of students.

[39:06] He has an office. And he teaches remote. In fact, he's been in Florida teaching for us. Andy Kern is my, academic dean. And Justin Lin is our director of technology and advancement.

[39:21] And he also teaches. But nothing on campus. Nobody comes to take a class. They just hold, have offices. And they're part of our, we call them administrative faculty because they run the school.

[39:33] I mean, when you think of a school, if you've ever been in education, there's record keeping, there's transcripts. All of that's very important to be able to, you know, student wants to transfer their transcripts out or transfer transcripts in.

[39:48] Grading, organization, all that's very important. But yeah, so that's, that's that answer. Sure. Sure. But, we, and I talked about not being, we're Bible Institute.

[40:01] We can offer degrees because under the state of, in the state of Wisconsin, as long as you are parochial in nature, in other words, religious, the state doesn't want anything to do with you.

[40:17] Now, if we got out of our lane and started offering classes in education or criminal justice or business, then we would be, we'd be in trouble probably.

[40:29] Wisconsin would love to make us in trouble. But anyway, but, so that's what we've done. it's, is we can offer those classes. And we've had other, other colleges accept our credits as well.

[40:40] We don't make promises on that, but they do have, some have. But yeah, we're, and we're not accredited. We're not looking to be accredited. We don't want, we know, I think accreditation's fine.

[40:53] I think it allows students to be able to transfer credits and all that. I think that's good. I'm not against it. For BBI, I am, because we want, we don't want any government. We don't get government money. We don't take GI Bill.

[41:05] That's why, as I come out and talk to people like you and other churches, that supporting BBI is something that is a necessity for us. But yeah. Again, thank you.

[41:16] And I do want to thank you guys for the support that this church does for BBI. It means a lot. And call us if you have any questions or go online. You can, actually, you can't apply now.

[41:27] I just found out. See, I'm just the president. I don't run the school. No. I just found out from my academic dean that you can't apply from paper. You go online to apply.

[41:39] And, hey, just part of it. But if you need help, we're here for you. So, if you need something. I'll help you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll hold your hand. You know, no problem there.

[41:51] It's funny because, as I said, I'm 60. Andy is 47, six. I don't know. He's not 47. And Justin just turned 42. I'm in my office going, Andy, could you come in here?

[42:03] I don't know how to do this on Microsoft Word. I need your help. And they come because I pay them. No. Anyway. But thank you guys again for the opportunity.

[42:13] And I appreciate your question about adversity, the separation between the two ministries. That's if you, if you have that. And that was good. It was good and encouraging. So.

[42:26] All right. Well, I thank you, God. That's great. A wonderful ministry. And like he said, anybody can be and should be a leader in life.

[42:37] Whether you just lead a family. Even if you're just leading a family, you've got to provide some kind of Christian education to your children. Or in a local church, you can just run Bible studies.

[42:48] Small groups, whatever it might be. Having some training is always worthwhile. And there's so many options it sounds like from being kind of face-to-face virtually with a teacher and also just taking the courses.

[43:00] Is it at, it's not completely at your own pace. I think there's some kind of deadlines. 16 weeks. I mean, we have students from time to time that'll, basically four weeks and you have a deadline turn in.

[43:12] Another four weeks you have deadline and probably a midterm and you converse with the instructor online or on the phone. You can talk to the instructor at any time. But you have to at the midpoint.

[43:23] And then another eight weeks, four or four, we've had students who have taken more and we show grace because we believe in the gospel of grace.

[43:35] But sometimes when it's a lot longer, you have to show law and cut them off. But typically we're very gracious with that. We understand one of the things I'll just tell you straight up.

[43:46] It's easier to take classes online than it is self-directed because you're in front of a teacher online. Distant study is difficult.

[43:57] It's discipline. Yes, sir. Do you use any type of teaching software like Blackboard or other software to follow the future?

[44:08] not right now. We're in the process of moving our certificate programs ever so slowly. We had to, we had an assistant who left and we couldn't replace her financially.

[44:20] But we're moving things into Moodle. You familiar with that? To that, it's that learning management system. And that's where we're moving to. We don't do Blackboard.

[44:30] Blackboard, and I know what Blackboard is. Blackboard is good, but with Zoom, we feel like the student is getting more face-to-face with the instructor.

[44:49] Whereas, if you know anything about Blackboard, you are, your task is to read something and evaluate and put input from other students and so forth and all that.

[44:59] And the instructor's there, I suppose, but we just strictly with face-to-face, like you were in a classroom with an instructor. PowerPoint, like that. But Moodle, we're moving into. That's a, that's a good program that we're looking at.

[45:12] We're not looking at, we're actively going that way. Another question, what about age? How old do you have to be? 17. 17 years old.

[45:23] And, well, 17, we'd have to find out where you are in the high school thing. Luke, Luke Board. just qualified. He had to wait for several months and he just started.

[45:35] So if you're 17, you're at your, your end of your homeschooling or your high school and, call us. We would, you know, we would talk with you and see if it would work out for you.

[45:47] I will say this. This, it's not Sunday school. You, it's, I just gave an, I'll just share my exam. I, as a teacher, it's better to give than receive.

[45:59] I just gave a three-hour exam of midterm and, I said, you can use any notes that we've given you, that I've given you.

[46:13] I give them all my PowerPoints. Anything you want. I've got, you've got two textbooks that you've been reading plus my notes plus other handouts. they're yours.

[46:25] Knock yourself out. You have three hours. 36 questions. And I've had students come back who've taken other classes and tell me that's the hardest test I've ever taken in my life because unless you know where it's at, you've got to go find it.

[46:42] And it's been kind of interesting. I don't teach all my classes that way, but this class I do. But it's, it's, it's, it's serious. We, you know, I said before when I signed my name to a diploma or degree, that means something to me.

[46:54] I'm putting my name on. I'm not saying that they're going to be perfect, but I am going to say I know what they've taken and that they've been taught well. And that's a commitment that we have. So, a little bragging on my test there, but I'm a pretty easy teacher, by the way.

[47:13] Anything else? All right. Thank you so much. Thank you.