Many of us may wonder why Jesus Christ waited until the age of 30 to start His earthly ministry. A pastor once said that in order to prepare for religious leadership during that time, men would need to complete a rigorous training regiment. If any would fail to meet the stringent standards, they would be deemed ineligible to become a Rabbi. As we can rightly assume, Jesus not only achieved those standards, but surpassed them. Those who completed the training were able to choose their disciples to mentor and teach, once they turned thirty years old.
In contrast, it is a testimony of God’s compassion and grace that Christ did not choose the wealthy, educated religious, but rather He chose the poor, uneducated “sinners” as His disciples. In a sense, He chose those who were rejected by society as unholy and sinful.
Today, those in America’s inner cities face a similar challenge in that most do not meet the educational standards, nor have the funds available to attend a seminary or other pastoral training school. It would be putting unrealistic expectations to ask a follower of Christ from the city to first go to a four-year college and then move out of the city to attend a seminary in order to be equipped for their calling of a church leader or pastor.
The Urban Ministry Institute (TUMI) of Chester exists to equip those who have been called to be leaders for the urban church by providing excellent, affordable seminary level education. The courses offered cost less than 15% of traditional seminary or graduate school tuition. They are also designed to accommodate those who may be functionally illiterate and each course is geared toward effective urban ministry focusing on the challenges and opportunities of serving Christ in the city.
Our Identity
The Urban Ministry Institute of Chester is a ministry of World Impact, an evangelical Christian missions organizations dedicated to ministering God’s love in the inner city.
Mission
The Urban Ministry Institute of Chester is a training institution that exists to equip leaders for the urban church, especially among the poor, in order to advance the Kingdom of God.
Vision
Equipping Leaders for the Urban Church
Objectives
• To equip urban Christian leaders who will evangelize and make disciples in urban America.
• To provide excellent and affordable ministry education that is sensitive to urban culture.
• To facilitate the multiplication of healthy, reproducing urban churches, especially among the urban poor.
• To promote and apply a biblical understanding of freedom, wholeness, and justice for the city.
• To provide a forum for discussion, research, and publication that compassionately addresses the aspirations and challenges of the city.
• To stimulate dialogue and cooperation among churches and urban ministries who seek to serve in the city.
Especially Among the Poor
Some ask why The Urban Ministry Institute's mission statement includes the phrase "especially among the poor."
By the year 2025, one out of every three people on the planet will live in urban poverty. We believe that God is raising up leaders who will go to the unreached millions among the urban poor in America and around the world. More importantly, we believe that God is raising up dynamic leaders from among the urban poor who deserve access to quality theological education.
This belief is not predicated simply on the urgent need, although God's Church should certainly respond in faith to the unique challenge of a swelling population. Rather, we assert that God has "chosen those who are poor in the eyes of this world to be rich in faith and to inherit the Kingdom which he promised to those who love him" (James 2:5). Whether we are rich, poor, or somewhere in between, we believe that Jesus has given all of us as believers a theological mandate to prioritize the poor in our life and ministry. As much as Christians may wish that poverty and oppression did not exist, to avoid talking about the problem will not bring a solution. We believe that the Church is God's agent for bringing Christ's Kingdom which leads to freedom, wholeness, and justice. Furthermore, we believe that people from families and communities struggling with urban poverty are not to be viewed simply as objects for Christian benevolence but as a dynamic leadership pool for the future of the whole Church. We believe that all training for Christian leadership must be done in the light of Christ's announcement that:
"The Spirit of the Lord is on me; therefore, he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, the proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." (Luke 4:18-19)
To the best of our ability, we will strive to be a Christian leadership training center which is accessible and relevant to Christian leaders, not on the basis of economics or social power, but on the basis of their calling by God to serve his Church.
Accreditation
The Urban Ministry Institute of Chester has deliberately chosen to function as a non-accredited training institution in order to remain available to as many students as possible. Our view is that the call of God, gifting by His Spirit, and practical experience in ministry are the most essential prerequisites for those desiring ministry training. We believe it is our responsibility as a missions-based training center to remain available to these students through innovative approaches to education.
The decision to remain non-accredited does not, in any way, reflect a lack of commitment to academic excellence. On the contrary, we believe that those preparing to do God's work deserve faculty who have been well-prepared academically and programs that present an intellectual challenge. At The Urban Ministry Institute, students will find courses that are both stimulating and demanding, along with a faculty of experienced ministers and missionaries who have earned degrees from outstanding colleges and universities.
Affirmation of Faith
1. There is one living and true God, infinitely perfect in glory, wisdom, holiness, justice, power, and love, one in his essense but eternally existing in three persons: God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. God sovereignly created the world out of nothing, so that his creation, while wholly dependent upon him, neither comprises part of God, nor conditions his essential perfection.
2. The books which form the canon of the Old and New Testaments are verbally inspired by God, inerrant in the original writing, the only infallable rule of faith and practice.
3. God created man in his own image, in a state of original righteousness, from which man subsequently fell by a voluntary revolt, and consequently is guilty, inherently corrupt and subject to divine wrath.
4. Jesus Christ, the eternal Son, became man without ceasing to be God by uniting to his divine nature a true human nature in his incarnation, and so continues to be both God and man, in two distinct natures and one person, forever. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, exhibited his deity by manifold miracles, fulfilled the requirements of the Law by his sinless life, shed his blood as a vicarious and propitiatory atonement for man's sin, was resurrected from the dead in the same body, now glorified. He ascended into heaven and now intercedes in glory for his redeemed as our great High Priest and Advocate, and as the Head of the Church and Lord of the individual believer.
5. The Holy Spirit convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment, thorugh the ministry of regeneration and sanctification applies salvation and places believers into the Church, guides and comforts God's children, indwells, directs, gifts, and empowers the Church in godly living and service in order to fulfill the Great Commision, and seals and keeps the believer until Christ returns.
6. Every man, regardless of race or rank, who receives the Lord Jesus Christ by faith is born into the family of God and receives eternal life. This occurs solely because of the grace of God and has no ground in human merit.
7. The Holy Church is the one institution specifically ordained by God to function in the furthering of the Kingdom until Christ comes again. It consists of all those regenerated by the Spirit of God, in mystical union and communion both with Christ, the head of the Body, and with fellow believers. Neighborhood congregations are the local manifestation of the Church universal. In obedience to the command of Christ, these congregations preach the Word of God, equip God's people for the work of ministry, and administer the Lord's Supper and Baptism.
8. The Lord Jesus Christ will return bodily, visibly, and personally to receive his own, to conform believers to his own image, and to establish his millenial Kingdom. He will judge the quick and the dead and will effect a final separation of the redeemed and the lost, assigning unbelievers to eternal punishment and believers to eternal glory, enjoying conscious fellowship with him.
9. Man's chief end in life is to honor and glorify Almighty God. Personal salvation is a means to this end.
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