Dear Friends,

You may have heard that Regent recently inaugurated the Bruce K. Waltke Chair of Old Testament Studies. It’s wonderful to see Dr. Waltke honoured for his enduring legacy of excellence in biblical scholarship. It’s also wonderful to see the first incumbent of this new chair, Dr. Matthew Lynch, embrace and carry forward that legacy. Regent College’s tradition of excellence in biblical teaching and scholarship is in good hands—which is why I’m asking you to support this teaching and scholarship by making a gift before October 17.

At his installation as our first Waltke Chair, Matt reflected on his “desire to carry on the legacy of careful and God-centred Old Testament scholarship and teaching here at Regent.” He also spoke of “the need for the church to recover its facility with the language of the Old Testament—to learn how to speak ‘OT’ fluently to meet the challenges and opportunities of our time.”

These two statements capture so much of the beauty of Regent’s biblical teaching. It’s careful—rooted in deep expertise and meticulous study of the text and its contexts. It’s God-centred—carried out with commitment to the Bible as God’s word, graciously given to us. It’s for the church—scholarship undertaken not for its own sake, or for the sake of mere academic discussion, but for the benefit of God’s people. And it is intended to meet the challenges and opportunities of our time.

As a teacher and scholar, Matt excels at bringing biblical truth to bear on timely issues and questions. As we all know, this isn’t a straightforward task! Matt’s work often touches on themes in the Old Testament, such as violence or the paradoxes of divine presence, that can make some people uncomfortable. Rather than skirting around this discomfort by dismissing either reader concerns or the integrity of the text, he challenges his audience to learn from the challenge itself. “The Old Testament,” he proposes, “purposefully perplexes its readers—not for perplexity’s sake, but as a pedagogical strategy that draws them more deeply into the wonder and mystery of God’s transcendent power and goodness.”

The church and the world need more work like this: biblical scholarship that is both challenging and pastorally sensitive, teaching that insists upon God’s goodness without attempting to tame him to suit our preferences. This is the kind of work that Matt Lynch and his colleagues do everyday. And they need your help to keep doing it.

Regent relies on our Annual Fund to support the work our faculty, staff, and students do throughout the year. Today, I’m asking you to make a gift to the annual fund in order to ensure this work can continue throughout this academic year.

Would you make a gift today?

In Christ,

Richard Thompson
Director of Advancement