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Co-founded in 1992 by Dr. Norman Geisler and Dr. Ross Rhoads, Southern Evangelical Seminary and Bible College offers students something unique that cannot be found anywhere else—accredited education programs, grounded in a classical philosophy of education, that take an integrated approach to philosophy, theology, and apologetics. Our unique structure is one reason SES has been ranked as one of the best apologetics programs in the country by TheBestSchools.org and a top ten evangelical seminary by SuccessfulStudent.org.
Much like a work of art made up of various puzzle pieces, the unique systematic approach to Christian thinking at SES will enable you to see how various, and sometimes seemingly unrelated, truths connect and interact with each other to form a unified whole. This deeply integrated approach applied to all of our programs will not only enable you to lovingly and persuasively proclaim and defend the Gospel in an increasingly hostile culture, but it will also enrich your own grasp of the “faith once for all handed down to the saints” (Jude 3).
Did you know that 54% of Americans believe that all truth is subjective with no moral absolutes? Would you believe that almost one quarter of American adults are “nones” (atheist, agnostic, or “nothing in particular”)? Unsurprisingly, close to 3 in 4 U.S. Millennials agree that whatever is right for your life or works best for you is the only truth you can know? Our post-Christian culture is lost in subjective confusion that is disassociated with reality. Apologetics-focused evangelism and discipleship are a must.
The state of the church is not much better. Recent surveys show only 41% of Senior Pastors have a biblical worldview (i.e., making sure our understanding/choices are consistent with God’s principles and commands). Even worse, only 12% of Children’s & Youth Pastors have a biblical worldview, and 54% of American churchgoers agree that religious belief is a matter of personal opinion rather than objective truth. The church needs people like you to consider a degree or certificate from SES .
Every believer equipped to effectively proclaim the Gospel, engage the bad ideas that stand in the way of the Gospel, and defend the truth of the Gospel in any cultural context
The mission of SES is to train men and women, based on the inerrant and infallible written Word of God, for the evangelization of the world and defense of the historic Christian faith
Every student will get an integrated and apologetics-focused Christian education that will equip them
to be steadfast in the truth
The goal of the SES faculty is to cause the student to discover truth in whatever context this discovery applies: biblical studies, theology, philosophy, or apologetics. The ideal student produced by SES will possess a love of the truth and the pursuit of the intellectual life, coupled with a love for God and growth in godly character. In so doing, we will have prepared our students to defend the historic Christian faith and evangelize the lost. As Étienne Gilson says in “The Eminence of Teaching,”
"The good teacher then loves to teach because he loves to impart to his pupils the very best thing there is in him, namely, intellectual life, knowledge, truth. … The highest reward of teaching is the joy of making other minds similar, not indeed to ourselves, but to the truth which is in us."
A conservative Christian orthodoxy in ethics and theology, if it be consistent, must also hold to a conservative Christian philosophy of education. It is the task of the educator to be responsible for his student’s intellectual life. His goal should be to shape the student’s mind in terms of its strength, focus, and precision, as well as modeling and instilling all the intellectual virtues that sustain a lifetime of faithful Christian scholarship.
In order to achieve our goal, we provide a unique educational opportunity where the Christian worldview is both a framework for thinking and a dynamic for living. To accomplish this, students should be taught not only to think correctly but also to pray fervently and to live uprightly (Jas. 5:16; Deut. 6:4–9; Mark 12:29–31). This occurs most effectively when both instructor and student relate properly to God and to one another through Christ, in view of His imminent return (Acts 1:7–8; 1 Thess. 4:13–18).
We believe this is best accomplished in an atmosphere where students are offered a Bible-based, Christ-centered (2 Cor. 10:5), and God-honoring education (1 Cor. 10:31); where teacher and learner endeavor to know both the truth and the times (1 Chr. 12:32; Phil. 2:14–15), and both the message and the milieu in which it is proclaimed. This philosophy of education carries over into how we approach our immersive digital campus experience.
