Church to Launch Pentecostal Seminary

VAN NUYS — A San Fernando Valley megachurch will launch a seminary next year that will be the only theological school on the West Coast for the steadily growing charismatic-Pentecostal movement.

The Rev. Jack Hayford, pastor of the 8,900-member Church on the Way and a nationally known figure in conservative Christian circles, said the seminary will open in September 1998 in an existing five-story education building on the church’s west campus.

“I see this as the primary thing I will be doing the rest of my life,” said Hayford, 62.

Over the last 27 years, Hayford turned a tiny congregation into a church that draws 5,000 worshipers each Sunday to services at both its original property on Sherman Way east of Van Nuys Boulevard and its west campus, formerly Van Nuys First Baptist Church, several blocks west on the same street.

As president-designate of the graduate-level school, Hayford is expected to attract faculty, students and financial support by drawing on his reputation as a reasoned voice for the tongues-speaking, charismatic-Pentecostal movement that has been embarrassed at times by flamboyant televangelists.

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The only Pentecostal-oriented seminaries west of the Mississippi River are an Assemblies of God institution in Springfield, Mo., and the Oral Roberts University School of Theology in Tulsa, Okla. ORU extension classes were held at Church on the Way until they were ended last May.

The Rev. Paul Chappell also resigned in May as dean of ORU’s seminary and was hired in August as dean and chief academic officer for Church on the Way’s new seminary.

“I knew of Pastor Jack’s dream and vision, but I did not leave ORU with the purpose of coming here,” said Chappell, who holds advanced degrees from Princeton Theological Seminary and Drew University in New Jersey.

“After 21 years at Oral Roberts, it was time to leave,” Chappell said. Nevertheless, Chappell said, he was excited about the opportunity “to pioneer a thoroughly evangelical, Spirit-filled seminary in a place like Los Angeles.”

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The name chosen for Hayford’s seminary--The King’s Seminary--is strikingly similar to The Master’s Seminary, a school begun 11 years ago at another Protestant megachurch, Grace Community Church of Sun Valley, whose senior pastor is the Rev. John MacArthur.

Both “king” and “master” are derived from Gospel references to Jesus. (Not coincidentally, The Master’s College in Newhall changed its name from Los Angeles Baptist College a few years ago after MacArthur became its president.)

The Master’s Seminary, which now shares facilities with its host church on Roscoe Boulevard, will start construction next month of a $5-million building being financed by people outside Grace Community Church, a spokesman said. The new building will include 25 faculty offices, library space for as many as 175,000 volumes, computer research areas and conference rooms, among other features.

The Master’s has graduated 270 men and has 241 currently enrolled, the spokesman said.

Hayford said he envisions that “within five to 10 years there will be 200 to 300 students” at The King’s Seminary.

But the two seminaries are likely to appeal to different constituencies within the broad evangelical wing of Christianity, officials of both schools agreed.

The Master’s Seminary, reflecting MacArthur’s teaching, holds theologically fundamental positions while avoiding the political activism often espoused by fundamentalists. MacArthur also disputes the validity of Pentecostal “gifts of the Spirit,” such as speaking in tongues, faith healing and prophecy, and castigates pastors perceived to be softening their preaching in favor of feel-good marketing techniques to attract churchgoers.

The King’s Seminary, expected to echo Hayford’s style of ministry, will honor the century-long growth of Pentecostalism, which caught fire from 1906 to 1908 at the Azusa Street Mission in Los Angeles, and 60 years later spread in moderated forms into mainline Protestant and Catholic churches as the charismatic movement.

The plans by Hayford for a new seminary in the Valley were welcomed by Richard Mayhue, senior vice president and dean of The Master’s Seminary.

Unlike The Master’s, which is all-male, The King’s Seminary will admit women. Hayford estimated that women constituted nearly 15% of the students who attended ORU’s now-defunct extension classes at Church on the Way. Hayford and his congregation are affiliated with the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel, a denomination founded in 1927 by the headline-grabbing evangelist Aimee Semple MacPherson.

At the same time, Hayford said in an interview that most women he sees in charismatic and Pentecostal church ministries tend to gravitate toward missionary, educational and nonpulpit roles.

“There are not many women, I think, who perceive of themselves as best serving as a senior pastor,” he said, while acknowledging that may be due to a cultural bias by conservative churches against women in the pulpit.

In a recently published book, “Pastors of Promise” (Regal), Hayford attempted to undercut what he said are misreadings of certain biblical passages by evangelical men who try to relegate women to second-class status in the church.

In launching The King’s Seminary, Hayford will also be bucking a long-standing Pentecostal tradition of being less concerned about the formal education of would-be pastors than about their spiritual gifts. Hayford’s seminary would not be the first Pentecostal seminary started in California--Melodyland Christian Center in Anaheim ran one for several years until it closed in the mid-1980s.

“I believe our largest clientele will be pastors that are already in service who now want to do graduate studies,” Hayford said. “I feel we’re going to have tremendous interest in the Asian, African American and Hispanic communities in that order.”

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The King’s Seminary, at least in its early years, will teach only in English. Hayford is optimistic that the school will appeal especially to young, English-speaking Korean ministers, citing his recent experience speaking to 1,600 Korean Christian educators at a large Korean church in Los Angeles.

Chappell, dean of the planned seminary, said the school hopes to have nearly 100,000 volumes in its library by the start of classes next year. The seminary will share the complex with The King’s Institute, a two-year Bible college, and a new continuing education program for pastors, Chappell said.

But because of ample classroom and office space, a chapel, a 1,150-seat church building and a gymnasium already available on the grounds, “it will be years before we would have to think about building anything extra,” Chappell said.