Jim and Janet Visbeek graduated from Northwest/ACTS in April 2006. They both earned the MA in Christian Studies, but Janet’s focus was in Chaplaincy. Dawne, one of their daughters, also graduated in April 2005 with the Master of Counseling degree. Jim is the Managing Director of Cedar Springs Retreat Centre, Sumas, Washington. They have three married children – Dawne, Aaron and Renee.

Jim, what led you and Janet to attend Seminary?

I was managing a large regional electrical and automation distributor in Bellingham, Washington. Every summer, Janet and I with our family attend conferences at Cannon Beach, Oregon. In 2002 the speaker challenged the audience to get off the curb and into the parade with respect to Christian life and ministry. God used that time to speak to me and encouraged me to start thinking about getting more involved in Christian service in some way. Without my knowledge Janet felt the same urging.

That same summer our daughter Dawne graduated from Moody Bible Institute in Counseling. She wanted to take a graduate program in counseling and applied to ACTS. When we shared what we thought God was urging us to do, she told us about ACTS and encouraged us to consider applying to seminary. So we decided to check it out.

We had not set vocational goals, but wanted to be obedient to God’s leading, unsure of how it all would turn out. So we applied to the MA in Christian Studies and were accepted. We wanted to be ready for whatever God might have us do.

Jim, you have been an entrepreneur for most of your adult life. How did you find the fit between your business experience and preparing in seminary for potential ministry leadership? What adjustments were necessary?

Yes, the adjustments were immense. I had to maintain my business throughout my seminary studies in order to support my family. Janet has a passion for Christian history and so she took to the studies naturally. For me, the move from the business context to the graduate classroom required greater energy and transformation. It required a different way of thinking – and writing papers!

Time management became critical. The first semester we both took four courses – we soon discovered that was a plateful! Yet, God enabled us to get through, but we moderated the pace during the ensuing semesters.

In some areas of study I found the relationship between business and ministry leadership quite similar. For example, in business I had to deal with a lot of conflict resolution and in seminary one of my courses dealt with conflict resolution and my internship that same semester involved me in conflict resolution work within a Christian agency. What I discovered was that the spiritual dimensions of conflict resolution in ministry contexts shaped the process and dynamics quite differently from my business experience.

We did the entire program part-time and through it all God marvelously enabled us to balance business, family, church, and seminary. The challenges were great, but God’s grace was sufficient. All five of our family were in college or grad school at the same time, so when we were all together, we would all compare our various studies.

Janet, what led you into chaplaincy?

When I began seminary, I had no inkling that I would select the chaplaincy option. My natural interests were in history and theology. I loved those subjects. In one of my Christian Leadership Development courses, my mentor happened to be a volunteer community support officer for the local 911 call centre. For one of my assignments I shadowed him in this work and discovered that I could minister in situations of personal trauma and death. So I followed this lead and found God opening up a whole new world of ministry opportunity. It was transforming for me.

Since you both were attending seminary together, how did this enrich the experience?

First, we are grateful for the spousal discount that reduced the overall costs substantially. Second, we discovered that our study patterns were quite different, but complementary. The papers we wrote when we took the same courses were very different. However, we could work through questions and issues together. Third, because our learning styles are quite different, we discerned different things in the courses.

After finishing Seminary, how did God lead you into your current roles?

When we graduated, we were still uncertain about the specific ministry situation that God might have for us. Initially we considered various opportunities for pastoral ministry. However, none of these seemed to be the right fit. Several months after graduation God directed us to the position of managing director at Cedar Springs Retreat Centre. As we interviewed for the role, prayed about it and considered our gifting and experience, this role seemed to provide a wonderful opportunity to blend business experience with pastoral ministry. We began serving in this role in Summer 2007. The longer we serve in this position the more it seems that this is what God was preparing us for many years ago.

Janet has the opportunity to work with staff, praying and encouraging them. She is a staff cheerleader, giving people hope. As well, she volunteers three or four twenty-four hour shifts each month as the support officer for the 911 emergency system in our area. This enables her to offer spiritual guidance for people in difficult, often life-threatening situations.

You are now leaders in the Cedar Springs ministry. Tell us about your vision for this ministry.

Cedar Springs desires to nurture Christian character and enrich the church by offering a peaceful, natural environment for adult discipleship. We want to fulfill this mission. And so we hope to expand our ability, for example, to help pastors who need a quiet space for restoration and recovery. Perhaps God will enable us to provide some programs that will strengthen marriages or help with parenting issues. Maybe we could offer some workshops on organizational leadership. We are also able to help fill in on Sundays for pastors in the area that need a break in pulpit supply. We are open to God’s direction here. We know there will be rich possibilities.

As you reflect back on your seminary experience in the context of the Cedar Springs ministry, can you discern general or specific ways in which your education through Northwest/ACTS has assisted you in pursuing God’s call?

In my (Jim) case Seminary enabled me to discern what ministry was all about. I had opportunities in my internship to teach, participate in conflict resolution, plan and initiate ministry projects, preach, etc. As I worked in my business, I would be reflecting on how means and methods of ministry were similar to but different from the business world. It also taught me not to be so judgmental. I do not know everything and I must listen to the views of other believers. When I reflect upon the way God led me in business and through seminary, I can see that He has equipped me in special ways to fill my current ministry position at Cedar Springs.

For me (Janet) Seminary opened up the world of chaplaincy. I probably knew it existed before Seminary, but I had no idea that God had gifted me for this ministry. The need to look at culture compassionately was impressed upon me. People are lost; the products of our culture constantly give voice to the pain of this lostness. There is a lot of hurt being expressed and God gave me through the Seminary the heart and skills to respond to these hurts through chaplaincy. As God transformed me through the Seminary experience, even my children noticed the difference.

Many people think that Seminary education only relates to people who are thinking of becoming pastors or missionaries. Obviously, this is not how God has led you, yet He has given you a very significant ministry. Do you think seminary education has relevance for Christians whose calling lies outside these traditional areas of vocational service?

We did not know how God would use us when we began our Seminary training. What we did know was that it was time to get started and to begin our preparation for whatever God had in mind. Seminary became for us the place to acquire understanding, skills, and spiritual depth so that we could serve wherever God would place us. We had to get up off the curb and into the parade and Seminary provided the best way for us to achieve that.

It has been transformational. I (Jim) remember reading the book Don’t Waste Your Life by John Piper. He challenged me as I was in my late forties to consider seriously what I was going to do with the last twenty years of my life. I was not satisfied with the status quo and this message energized me to seek God’s direction. Today I am filled with a sense of wonder that God has given us this opportunity at Cedar Springs. We would not be in this role today, unless we had taken those first steps several years ago.

Seminary can be a significant place to discern more clearly how God is directing your path and to be equipped to serve Him as clarity is received.

Debbie completed a Certificate in Christian Studies in 1975 and John completed an M.A. in Christian Studies in 1980 —focusing on Soren Kierkegaard. John and Debbie have been married for 30 years and have 3 married Children and 3 grandchildren.

In the years since graduation, what kinds of ministry has God led you both to be involved in?

We are thankful for multiple opportunities for music ministry and the integration of the arts into worship in several local churches, at TWU and in Kenya, as well as taking turns as an elder and a Sunday School teacher. As we have traced the fingerprint of God’s influence in our life, we have found that God’s calling is not just the discernment of a detailed “12 point plan,” but rather, (following Os Guiness) that a “call” implies a “caller,” e.g. the relational reality that we are first called to “Someone, rather than something or somewhere.” Another important lesson we have learned is that a Christian calling also implies that – at a foundational level at least - there is not a radical disjunction between being a “paid church worker” and working in a “secular” job. Whether we possess a label as a “pastor” or a “teacher” is not the crucial issue; rather the key question is our response of love to God, of love to others and of denial of self. We have been significantly impacted by Paul’s related sentiment in 2 Cor. 4:11: “We who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body.”

I have noticed your name, John, in several local papers in recent years in regards to something called “U-connect”. Can you explain what that is?

One of the positive developments in the BC public school system and Langley School district is the priority given to developing schools of choice; there is a recognition that a diverse student population requires diverse learning opportunities. A number of years ago we were given the opportunity to implement a program (now called U-Connect) which is designed to support home-learners. If a home-based learner agrees to meet provincial learning standards and to be supervised by a teacher, we give them a number of great resources including vast curriculum resources, virtual computer-based learning options, kits, accreditation and testing. We also have a building in South Langley where most families come for one or two days a week for a variety of core subjects and innovative electives. The atmosphere is informal and family-based with core specialties in fine arts and technology. Because of the inherent flexibility of our model of home-school partnership, there is ample scope for students to aggressively pursue their educational interests. Many of our students have traveled the world by entering international competitions in internet software development and robotics technology. For example, last year a team of budding engineers won NASA’s design in excellence award at the Johnson Space Centre in Houston as they competed against other teams in the neutral buoyancy lab, replicating the repair of the Hubble Space Telescope with a sophisticated underwater robot they designed.

While I have been involved with U-Connect, Debbie has been teaching many piano students. This provides an opportunity for her to help young people to not only develop valuable character qualities such as diligence and a desire for excellence, but also to resist the trends of the commercialization of “pop-culture music” by inculcating a love for the classics. She has found that children do love the “Beethovens” and the “Bachs” if they are properly challenged. Music also provides an opportunity to connect with the church – regardless of their former exposure.

What led you to develop this vision? What do you think it is accomplishing in the lives of young people?

For many students, our model allows them to thrive educationally; for example, those who find that learning comes easily can move more quickly through the grades. Conversely, those who have learning difficulties have the advantage of much more “one-on-one” interaction at home and small class sizes at our school.

As you reflect back over your ministry experience, can you discern general or specific ways in which your education through Northwest has assisted you in pursuing God’s call?

John – Seminary is a valuable investment to enrich the quality of our spiritual lives. In the midst of the hectic demands of a typical career, it is difficult to find time to think about and connect with God and to contemplate the crucial questions of life. Like most domains of knowledge in the last few years, the volume of research in biblical studies has exploded. I benefited by having the sharp literary “eyes” of trained theologians to help distill the truly important data and to provide the interpretive tools necessary for life-long Biblical learning. Secondly, seminary was a time when we could discern our giftedness as we interacted with mentors who helped us discern the “shape of our souls.” Thirdly, our relationships with our peers extended from exciting classroom stimulation to lifelong friendships. The crux of the matter is this: without this experience, the Bible would have remained for us a two-dimensional book; seminary added that illuminating third dimension. It is tragically easy for my mind to cruise year after year in a conceptual “auto-pilot” mode. Seminary gave me an opportunity to step out of the “mental ruts” and see the bigger picture of God’s purposes and person.

Debbie – From the vantage point of “looking back” I am thankful for the influence of my year at Northwest in shaping my Christian faith. The call to love God with all my mind was shaped by courses such as New Testament Survey which taught me that the Bible is more than a few well-known verses. I was drawn into what has become a lifelong thirst to know how God is dealing with the whole of human history as well as in my personal life. The call to love our neighbours as ourselves, in my role as a wife, mother, and music teacher, was shaped by other courses such as Foundations for Christian Living with its emphasis on the agape principle. And living in residence created a great balance between studying and loving people.

We are now well into the first decade of the 21st century. What has changed in the way Christians look at their surrounding culture and seek to engage it, since you graduated?

I think Christians are more interested in the social dimensions to discipleship than they were three decades ago. Also, Christians are putting a great deal of thought towards harnessing the internet communications revolution. Any technological revolution is always a “double edged sword.” In our era technology greatly multiplies the number of communicative choices, yet church leaders are finding that expanding choices seem to be correlated with lower levels of church commitment. Also, while the internet gives access to a virtual “universe” of knowledge in our back pockets, the internet style of communication - with its millions of disassociated “searches” and “clicks” - tends to fragment knowledge, disseminating it in short, sketchy, entertaining bite-sized bits. Many pastors are finding that the “bite-sized” mentality creates a less than receptive audience for serious expositional sermons!

Many people think that Seminary education only relates to people who are thinking of becoming pastors or missionaries. Obviously, this is not how God has led you, yet He has given you a very significant ministry. Do you think seminary education has relevance for Christians whose calling lies outside these traditional areas of vocational service? Why?

Some would argue that “real-world” experience is a more important rubric of success than the theological understanding implied in a seminary degree. My question for this attitude is this: Why do we need to choose between the “understanding” of seminary and the “experience” of the real world? Regardless of whether you are a pastor or a missionary or a computer programmer, you are called to become a certain type of person – an image-bearer of Jesus. Part of being an image bearer involves a deepening understanding of Who you are imaging. Seminary provides a unique setting and opportunity for this to occur.