Video Transcript: Welcome to Christian Leaders Institute

Henry - Hi, my name is Henry Reyenga, the president of Christian Leaders College and  Institute. And with me is Professor Steve Elzinga. Together, we have been working for over 30  years. And we welcome you and welcome you again to Christian Leaders College and  Institute.  

Steve - Right. And it's a journey that is going to be an amazing journey for you. It's been an  amazing journey for us.  

Henry - Yes.  

Steve - We we started out together as church planters, and we built churches, we reach  people, but we always had a vision of how, how can we mobilize people? How do we connect  people to God? And how does that connection result in ministers, people that minister to  people, people that go out and make a difference in the lives of people?  

Henry - What do we mean by Minister, you know, the Bible talks about the word minister, it's  the word actually diakonos. And Jesus said to His disciples, in the book of Mark, if you want to  be great, must be the diakonos, the minister. Then in the book of Acts, we see how the  apostles needed more help. The early church was expanding, and who was going to help so  there was an issue and, and then we read about the minister group where Stephen was  mentioned and others and Stephen was actually one of the first martyrs. But he was a  minister. And then we see in the New Testament think about what Paul said that I, you know,  I'm a minister, diakonos of the gospel. And then we see in the book of Romans, I commend  you, Phoebe, a minister, here's someone who's carrying the book of Romans. And then we see that word even is used in around 112, there are two female slaves were ministers, and that  was a Greek word Minister translate to Latin word ministrae. So ministers, and then  throughout the history of the church, ministers are agents stewards, called by God, to  proclaim the gospel to serve to bring reconciliation between God and humanity and each  other.  

Steve - Now Henry, some of the students have signed up here and they're taking this class to  figure out, you know, how this all works. And you're calling the ministers right off the bat. It's  like, are they like, is that somewhat intimidating? Or what? How are you using minister in a  different way than maybe it has been traditionally, you know, most of us think of ministers is  the guy who gets up front stands behind the pulpit, does some preaching.  

Henry - Right?  

Steve - Is that you?  

Henry - Well, in the early church thought of Minister, as a volunteer, as a part time, or a  career minister, and that was actually the thinking around the third and fourth century, they  started making it only career. And then that was paid only  

Steve - specific roles, of preaching. limited roles,  

Henry - limited roles, We are going back to how the original understanding of Minister is that  we are Christian leaders, called by God, to be used by him to proclaim the gospel to minister  to others, to bring reconciliation to God and each other.  

Steve - So if you're a parent, for example, and you're trying to raise your children in a  Christian lifestyle, right, you're a minister,  

Henry - you're a minister, 

Steve - because you're called to lead your family. Or if you're evangelizing your neighbor,  we're called to lead you're actually doing what a minister does, right? Or if you're leading a  Bible study, or if you're trying to help counsel, a new newly married couple, or if you're  volunteering to do something in your church, if you're leading in any way, if you're trying to  help out anybody  

Henry - in the name of Christ,  

Steve - you are a minister.  

Henry - And we are here to help you get training on ministry training, so that you can be more confident and competent as a minister.  

Steve - Right. So we have classes that you can take, we have how many?  Henry - over 100  

Steve - over 100 classes that will help you in various roles of ministers. Yeah, sometimes we  think a minister is this the guy who preaches or the guy who leads a church? There are many  different kinds of roles of ministers. There's Life Coach, Minister, yeah, a program. There's  ministers who just conduct weddings or funerals, or my counselors or Bible study leaders or  church planters or businessmen that just want to make a difference in the arena of business.  

Henry - Ministry Biz we call it.  

Steve - entrepreneurs. We have courses on all those things, right? So we're here to help you  become the minister that God is calling you to, to become. And maybe you don't know what  that is yet, right? But that's part of what this class is about. Right?  

Henry - Right. In this class, in a sense orientates you onboards you whatever you want to call  it, gives you a landing, because maybe you haven't studied for a long time. So we're gonna  teach you about, you know, academic literacy, but hopefully in a ministry fun way, right?  We're gonna talk about habits,  

Steve - goals, how to study,  

Henry - time management,  

Steve - your purpose, your calling, all these things that maybe right now you have sort of an  idea of, and maybe some of you know, for sure, but others of you are like, you know, I just, I  was curious, I'm here. And I'm telling you, if you are curious, then you're in the right place.  

Henry - That's right.  

Steve - And we we encourage you to keep going with this specific class, because this class,  we're trying to motivate you, we're trying to inform you, we're trying to encourage you, we're  trying to give you clarity for your life and your purpose and your calling in God's kingdom.  

Henry - And what you'll find is, the Holy Spirit will lead you to make a few decisions, like, Is  this something I really want to do, right, you'll find new confidence that you can accomplish  something in this class, we will allow you to take the quizzes more than once. So you can sort  of get on boarded to study again. In this class, you will learn about how to succeed at  studying ministry, 

Steve - and hopefully succeed at life. In some ways, it's not just about ministry, it's about  helping you get connected to God helping you get connected to God's purpose, help you  figure out that, that God has called you for a purpose. He has something in mind for your life.  And we're here to encourage you and lift you up and and push you forward it by God's grace,  or the Holy Spirit, we're trusting the Holy Spirit will be using everything that is done here. For  his, his glory,  

Henry - a couple of things to know, these classes are, these courses are free. Now what does  that mean? It means that people have supported the giving of this opportunity to us. So it's  not about you having to pay money or anything like this. Now, what does that mean? Further,  it means that somebody's made donations, and many students who've been impacted by this  right? Now have made donations, we call them the vision partners, right. But nothing is  required of you know, this is your curious journey of ministry. Also Kingdom donors have  supported this as well. So know that this is a free exchange.  

Steve - And, you know, we have learned that when people start out, they're skeptical, yes,  Henry - you are already skeptical. I understand that.  

Steve - But the testimony of student after student and We hear it all the time, you know,  when I came in, I was unsure and I'm wondering when the hammers gonna come down. And  but they all give a testimony, you know,it was?  

Henry - Yeah, yeah. So you're here on a journey. And we don't know where that's going to go.  And, you know, we have a lot of professors, people who are accomplished accredited in  ministry training, and you're going to get exposed to you know people who really know.  Theology, like Dr. David Feddes, our provost is an accomplished teacher, and he's one of the  professors as well as 50 or more other professors and all sorts of topics. So that's going to be  interesting to see where that takes you in that way as well.  

Steve - Right. So you're thinking free, a lot of times free means the quality goes down.  Henry - Oh, well, just taste and see about that. I want to give you no illusions. This is hard.  Steve - Yeah. It's not a lot of fluff.  

Henry - This is the Harvard of free Yes, this is not our get through something real quick and  get a certificate in the mail. This is difficult,  

Steve - because our goal is not that you get a certificate or that you somehow get through  courses. Our goal is that you actually get equipped yes for Whatever God is calling you to do.  

Henry - So now, we have classes at the award level, let's call it adult education level, we have awards, and those are generally through Christian Leaders Institute. But some of you, I should say one more thing about that. That's more for those who are sort of volunteer those who are  maybe part time. You're, you're learning, in part time ministry, you know, you're just, you're a  single mom, and you want to learn how to parent your child better. There's a lot of  

applications for that. Some of you are on a career path, you'd actually like to go on to master  study. And you can't believe that the college offers low fee, credential college credentials, that for a low fee, you actually can get a college credential and you're wondering. So there's this  low fee college credential. And there are partners that will take this bachelor degree you can  earn here to get a master study. So why go someplace else when you can get a bachelor's  degree here that goes on to a master study, whether that's a divinity study, masters of  divinity, whether it's chaplaincy, there's even Ohio Christian University where you can get a  MBA or a Masters of Business by taking a divinity or a degree here. So very affordable. If 

you're a homeschooling family, or if you already are in debt quite a bit. And you didn't finish  anything, you can transfer credits over here, you can get into the college program  

Steve - The school, I went to cost $50-60,000 now to get a just a graduate, bachelor's degree, right. And then I went on to seminary to get my master's degree. But you know, if I was doing  it now, I could do it at CLI for  

Henry - my daughter, Abigail, she almost has her Bachelor's degree it's to 20 or 2020 Right  now, and she was her bachelor's degree and already thinking about which master's program  she's going to go into next. So whether you're, you know, on a volunteer, track you sponsor,  you've already got your degree, but you want to take some classes on ministry, whether you  want to have a career track of study, Christian Leaders College offers that. But there's one  more thing, some of you, you know, are seeking licensed or ordained clergy roles. And we  actually have a clergy program. Can we get my little hat here?  

Steve - Well, you can see it on the shirt.  

Henry - Oh yes, right here on the shirt. We have a clergy program that has several  components to it. It has training, ministry training, it has recommendation pieces where I  don't tell the world look at me. I'm licensed or ordained, it also has a international directory,  you know, this is not an online ordination. In the ordinations, you can buy, at like a diploma  mill or an ordination mill where I just signed my name or I type in I pay $150. And then they  send me some credential. This is actually a for real grounded program of ministry training  with recommendations, a local prayer that that for your local area, the government can look  at our Christian Leaders Alliance website, and they can see that what this is, like in places like Tennessee that do not allow or their government does not want to allow online ordinations,  this is a beautiful thing, because it's not technically an online ordination. It's like how the  church has always done it. But the training is online, right? So we welcome you. And in these  next classes, what what can they expect now in these classes as they sort of get oriented to  Christian Leaders, College Institute and Alliance?  

Steve - This is where you're starting, and we want you to, we want you to start out running,  right? So we're going to motivate you, we're going to give you the basics of how you can  succeed with this online study. online study is not exactly the same thing as maybe where you went to high school and it was a class, right and there was a teacher, there's certain things  that lead to success that we've learned over the years. We know what it takes to succeed at  this and where the some of the stumbling blocks are, where the walls are. So we talked about  walls, we're talking about how to get over the walls. So you know, we're not we're not we're  not just claiming this is going to be easy. We're going to show you, this is where it's hard. This  is what you need to do to get over the thing. The sense of God's calling in your life. Some of  you may, or may be skeptical about your ability to do anything. So we address all these,  everything in this class is designed to help you actually thrive and succeed, and you may be  nervous about it, you may be doubtful about it. And by the end of this thing, I think you'll be  confident you'll be, you'll be able to look at the different certificates we have, and programs  and the classes, and you'll have way better chance of trying to figure out your way into your  future. This is all about what God may be calling you to do, it's not about what we're trying to  get you to do. You might be here just to learn more about Christianity, right? You may take  one class, or two classes, or whatever it is, that's it. In fact, you can, you can check out all the classes, you can listen to a lecture here, you can listen to a lecture here before you even sign  up to the class, right? So it's all there to help you figure out what God wants to do with you,  no matter what it is.  

Henry - Now, this class is required. And the reason being we've learned because we have a  small budget, relatively speaking, we don't have a lot of customer service personnel, we have some and they're very willing to serve whenever they can. But we have found that a class like

this helps you do well, that you can just go about what you're doing, and do it well without  having to like stumble constantly. So we're excited, you're here. Just go through the class,  watch the lectures, it will come little by little, and you'll hear that word pretty soon. And when  you're done with this class, you're ready to launch that I mentioned before, you can take the  quizzes more than once because we want you to learn how to the flow of the quizzes and all  of that. So this is an easy A. Now, I want to know some of you might be thinking, Oh, I'm not  gonna watch I'm just gonna take the quizzes again and again until I get the right answer and  don't do that. And by the way, we have an algorithm that tells us if you cheated the system,  so we  

Steve - don't cheat yourself.  

Henry - Yeah, really. That's the key issue, right? Yeah, don't cheat yourself. So welcome  aboard. May God bless you greatly as you're here. And don't disqualify yourself from this  moment and this opportunity. Go to the next one.