I got expelled from seminary.
To be accurate, I was gently encouraged to leave.
I didn't do anything wrong; and neither did the seminary.
I had already been teaching for awhile, but there was a splinter in my brain (that sounded a lot like my mother :-) insisting that I should be a pastor.
After a year of study, several theology classes and a mind-numbing sojourn into Koine Greek, I sat down with my advisor. He talked me through a set of interest inventories I had completed. He asked me pointed questions about my heart for different aspects of ministry.
Near the end of our conversation, he said, "Peter—you should not be a pastor. God has made you a teacher. Go and teach well."
I have learned a lot since that conversation in 1991. Mostly I have learned to retroactively appreciate the gracious release from a dream that wasn't really mine. I've learned that I was built to lead through challenging, questioning, explaining and inspiring. Those could have been good pastor-teacher qualities, but I lacked the nurturing, comforting, and caring impulses that make the best pastors minister effectively.
A lot of our students need someone to pull the college splinter from their brain.
A lot of our students need to be told graciously and lovingly that "college is a round hole and you are a beautiful trapezoid. Go be a chef, a designer, a builder, a painter. Harvest lumber, care for children, build a life with your hands and your heart. Let the people who live in their heads thrive at college. You go and live in the world of people and things."
A new report from Harvard University backs me up.
Let's expel students from the falsely universal expectations of college and some high school programs as well.
Let's release them to a different kind of greatness.
