Real Ministry, Real Pain

It’s a scene we are all familiar with: The service has ended, the benediction given, the coffee and baked goods accompany the half-hour conversations before folks step out the door, get in their vehicles, and go on to the rest of their Sunday and week. But that’s not always the whole scene. Hidden in the margins are quiet conversations out of earshot of others, sharing pain that cannot, and in many cases should not, be shared publicly. Also hidden are the conversations left unsaid. These are the undercurrents of turmoil, pain, trauma, and hurt dwelling on wooden pews or hidden behind stacking chairs in church buildings across our denomination.

This is just one aspect of their calling that ministry leaders face daily. How does one weigh the delicate balance of care, privacy, love, and truth? How does one know their own capabilities and also when to seek additional guidance and recommend professional help? Our denomination takes these questions to heart and has resources and programs that adapt to changing needs and contexts. As a ministry of the CRCNA, Calvin Theological Seminary is one piece of the larger picture.

The holistic theological education at Calvin Seminary focuses on the entire person, forming them as discerning, biblically wise, gospel-shaped leaders prepared to engage in that balance of ministry. Our Master of Arts in Clinical Mental Health Counseling program has played a significant role in answering the changing needs of the church. Additionally, our vocational formation specifically fulfills our “holistic” education promise, preparing students for real ministry by engaging with real pain through mentor groups, contextual learning, assessments, and tools for growth.

Evie Dykhouse (M.Div. 2027) says of her experience, “There’s so much pain in this world and so much suffering, I appreciate that our classes don’t try to skirt away from it. … As ministry leaders and pastoral caregivers, these are the things we are going to see.”

We describe the educational experience at Calvin Seminary as “Head, Heart &Practice.” We purposely use an ampersand instead of “and.” When authors work closely together on a book or paper, the ampersand signifies that close collaboration. This is a picture of what we offer students who will answer calls in the CRCNA and beyond. Recent M.Div. (2025) graduate and Ph.D. student Leah Jolly talks about this holistic formation: “I would argue that the best education is academically very rigorous and challenging … and it integrates with what you are doing outside the classroom. I would say the hardest classes I’ve taken are the ones that have challenged my heart and my practice the most.”

The church cannot fix every wound, and we do not know all the ways God works for renewal in the lives of our congregations and communities. Sometimes those quiet conversations will not bring healing. But our calling at Calvin Seminary is to prepare students to work toward healing nonetheless.

As Jessica Joustra, Ph.D., incoming professor of systematic theology, stated in a recent article, “In Bavinck’s view … the gospel ‘embraces the whole of human existence’; it touches all of life as a ‘joyful tiding ... for the entire cosmos.’ God, in his glory and goodness, is sovereign over all. Because of this, theology must be doxological; we ought ‘not rest satisfied (until we have) traced back everything to the sovereign good pleasure of God as its ultimate and deepest cause.’”