Owen Strachan will join Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary’s (MBTS) faculty July 1 as associate professor of Christian theology and director of a forthcoming center for theology and culture, MBTS President Jason Allen announced June 22.
Strachan currently is assistant professor of Christian theology and church history at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and its Boyce College and director of the seminary’s Carl F.H. Henry Institute for Evangelical Engagement.
Strachan also is president of the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood.
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Owen Strachan |
“Dr. Strachan is one of the brightest young minds in the Southern Baptist Convention and the broader evangelical world,” Allen said. “He is a gifted thinker and author, and we are thrilled to have him coming to Midwestern Seminary. There is no question he will further strengthen our accomplished faculty.”
Allen added, “Dr. Strachan is both thoughtful and convictional, and he is the perfect man to lead our forthcoming center on theology and culture. It will be a serious center, led by a serious man, engaging the most serious and urgent theological and cultural issues of our generation. And, ultimately, the center will serve the church, comporting with Midwestern Seminary’s mission to exist for the church.”
Strachan called it “a thrill to join a surging seminary. This is a rare privilege in our time, when many schools are moving away from traditional training. I love and share the robust vision of theological education that Midwestern Seminary has so effectively promoted. There is no more important work in the world than training future leaders of God’s church. This is life or death stuff. The blessing of the Lord is on this school, and it’s hard not to want to be a part of that.”
Strachan, author of several books being released this year, said his role at Midwestern also will allow “for maximal writing time, which is a calling on my life.”
“I relish engaging the culture and believe that it is a vital part of doctrinal instruction,” Strachan said. “It’s my hope that the center for theology and culture will serve as a power plant for knowledge of the Word and the times. … [S]ecularism, Islam and sexualized postmodernism are, in reality, opportunities – gospel opportunities. I want to help train up an army of gospel Navy SEALs who … show that Christ is all.”
Five books by Strachan are being released this year: The Colson Way (Thomas Nelson); Reawakening the Evangelical Mind (Zondervan); The Pastor as Public Theologian (Baker); Designed for Joy (Crossway); and Essential Evangelicalism: The Enduring Influence of Carl F.H. Henry (Crossway). His book Risky Gospel: Abandon Fear and Build Something Awesome was published in 2013, preceded by Jonathan Edwards, Lover of God; Jonathan Edwards on Beauty; Jonathan Edwards on the Good Life; Jonathan Edwards on True Christianity; and Jonathan Edwards on Heaven and Hell. He also is the editor of The Pastor as Scholar, the Scholar as Pastor: Reflections on Life and Ministry by John Piper and D.A. Carson.
Strachan is a research fellow of the SBC’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission and a contributing writer for The Gospel Coalition. His articles also have appeared in The Atlantic, Washington Post, First Things and Christianity Today and he has been profiled in WORLD magazine as a young evangelical leader and by Baptist Press for his pro-life work.
Strachan holds a doctorate in theological studies from the Chicago-area Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, a master of divinity degree from Southern Seminary and an undergraduate degree in history from Bowdoin College in Bruswick, Maine, his native state. At Trinity, he was the managing director of the Carl F.H. Henry Center for Theological Understanding and associate director of the Jonathan Edwards Center.
Jason G. Duesing, MBTS provost, said Strachan’s ability “to contribute to the seminary faculty as a writing theologian as well as an accomplished classroom lecturer makes him a welcomed addition to our team of scholars and instructors. Like the Kansas City Royals, with all-stars at every spot on the field, we are having fun pursuing our gospel work with some of the greatest faculty in evangelicalism.”
Strachan’s heart “for training and shaping ‘pastor-theologians’ fits perfectly under our ‘for the Church’ banner,” Duesing said. “That he also brings expertise on the great evangelical theologian, Carl F.H. Henry, to the task of teaching theology could not come at a better time for theological education. In our day, we need the wisdom of Henry more than ever.”
Strachan will be relocating to Kansas City with his wife, Bethany, and their three children.
(EDITOR’S NOTE – T. Patrick Hudson is executive assistant to the president of Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary.)