Equipping Through Ministry

When generous donors approached the staff at First Baptist Church (FBC) Temple about a significant gift they wanted to make toward a special project, Senior Pastor Joe Loughlin and Teaching and Communications Pastor Evan Duncan began to dream. 

The church had recently implemented a team approach to preparing sermons. FBC Temple has two venues on their campus, and a commitment to featuring live preaching in worship meant that two preachers were needed to preach the four weekly services in each venue. While Loughlin and Duncan preach a majority of the sermons, Worship and Care Pastor David Goddard and Missions Minister Josh Flores Olvera also preach regularly. This preaching group began preparing their sermons as a team. 

Through the new team approach, each member of the team preaches his own sermon but with input from the rest of the team on illustrations, language, and insight into the text. FBC Temple is a growing church, and each service includes multiple generations, genders, ethnicities, backgrounds, and experiences. With the opportunity provided by their donors and considering their new sermon preparation model, Loughlin and Duncan envisioned adding a seminary student as a Preaching Resident to their team. The Resident, they believed, could gain needed preaching experience while also adding a helpful perspective to their preaching team.

Interested in exploring this idea, Loughlin and Duncan turned to a place where they knew they could find a competent, spirit-led seminary student—Baylor University’s Truett Seminary. After one meeting between the FBC Temple and Truett teams, the Truett Ministry Resident Program was born. 

Part mentorship opportunity, part ministry internship, the Ministry Resident Program is designed to connect some of Truett’s most gifted and motivated students with ministry opportunities in leading partner church's within the Truett Church Network (TCN). For students, the program offers invaluable practical experience and training to better equip them for the tasks of ministry in addition to providing opportunities for mentoring and gaining experience on a healthy church staff. Churches then have the opportunity to incorporate the training of young ministers into their mission while also receiving an additional part-time staff member. 

“Jesus told us that disciples are not greater than their teachers, but those that are well-trained will be like their teachers. Transformative seminary education requires both classroom instruction and opportunities for learning in dynamic ministry settings.”

TODD D. STILL, PHD, 
TRUETT SEMINARY DEAN

Interested students commit to investing 10 to 15 hours per week in the ministry of the church while partner churches commit to give at least $10,000 to the Truett Church Network to support the work of that student over an academic year. One hundred percent of this gift is passed on to the Resident as a scholarship. 

After creating the Ministry Resident Program template with FBC Temple, the Truett Church Network shared about the new Program with a select number of churches in Central Texas closely connected with Truett. The Program quickly began to multiply.

Concord Missionary Baptist Church in Dallas and Primera Iglesia Bautista in Waco quickly followed FBC Temple as Ministry Resident Program partner churches.  

Emmanuel Roldan, Senior Pastor at Primera, shared that over the past five years, many Truett students have blessed his church in ways he never imagined, and the church’s heart has always been to provide tangible ways of blessing them in return by equipping them and sending them as they respond to God’s call on their life. The Truett Resident Program brought together this desire to bless Truett students with the mechanism for doing so as the church grows and has need for ministers to lead fellowship, discipleship, and equipping for Primera’s membership. 

“We believe the Ministry Resident Program will help us execute our mission in tangible ways that bless our students, congregants, and the Waco community,” Roldan said.