Mike Seaver’s Story

Mike graduated from the Pastors College in 2007, is the senior pastor of Risen Hope Church in Summerville, SC, and serves on the Sovereign Grace National Church Planting Group and the Mid-South Regional Church Plant Committee.

At age 27, after having finished my Masters of Divinity degree, I was working in a thriving ministry as a College and Youth Pastor in a good church, and adding to a growing resume of pastoral experience. One question kept nagging me though. I knew I was currently qualified for pastoral ministry per the requirements of 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1, but could I stay qualified? Seminary had taught me much about watching my doctrine. I had good theology classes, I’d spent hours writing lengthy papers, and I had professors that helped me trace the smallest error in theological exegesis. However, my wife and I had recently had our first child and were pregnant with our second. We had no clue how to be godly parents, and the tensions of sleepless nights and parenting exasperations exposed weaknesses, which we had previously been blind to, in our marriage. The question lingered. How can I stay qualified?

In 2005, I was exposed to Sovereign Grace Churches while attending a conference to hear my favorite pastor, John Piper. To my surprise, at the conference I found a reunion of pastors and wives that did not only watch their doctrine (though they seriously cared about doctrine), but they also had a robust plan for watching their lives as well. After the conference, my wife and I began feasting on the books and sermons from Sovereign Grace Pastors. We found that it was shaping our communication with one another, awakening us to a greater understanding of the gospel, and helping us learn to parent in faith and not in fear.

In 2006, we moved to Crossway Community Church in Charlotte, NC for an internship, and then were sent to the Pastors College (then in Maryland). The Pastors College brought excellent teaching and great practical wisdom for pastoral ministry. Our instructors helped us to drink deeply of the Word of God and learn much theological knowledge, but they also cared about how we would pastor people in our churches. They cared about us having hearts like the Good Shepherd and the humility like 1 Peter 5 exhibits. The atmosphere of the Pastors College also helped me watch my life and doctrine. The fraternity atmosphere of the 20 guys in the class built lifelong friendships. The weekly times of accountability allowed the Holy Spirit to expose areas where He was working to conform me more to Christ. The monthly Care Groups with Gary and Betsy Ricucci brought a model of how to encourage and correct in a culture of grace. The Pastors College is purposeful. It is intentional in being an incubator (and sometimes a boot camp) of spiritual learning and spiritual growth.

Now that I’ve been pastoring in a Sovereign Grace church for almost 13 years, I look back at my Pastors College experience with gratefulness. I’ve often told people about how many of the ways I live out my pastoral ministry is directly based on what I learned that year. I often find myself in discipleship settings beginning a sentence with, “In the Pastors College, I learned…” or “I remember [insert PC lecturer] saying…”. I look forward to sending men from my church plant to the PC in the future. I look forward to them learning as much as I did.

However, what benefited me the most from my Pastors College experience was not a growing theological knowledge, or preaching improvement, or even the ongoing friendships. My greatest joy in thinking about the Pastors College is how much it impacted my marriage. My wife and I grew tremendously in learning how to trust the Lord, embrace a difficult living situation, and juggle the demands of family life with my school. I learned how to watch my life, how to be a better husband, and ultimately be a pastor that stays qualified (Lord willing)!