Faithful and Effective: Partnering with Gifted Executive Leaders

By Evan R. Hunter, PhD

At the end of September, the Board of Directors for Arab Baptist Theological Seminary (ABTS) gathered around Wissam Nasrallah to pray for him as he began his tenure as the school’s next President. A young leader who had been living abroad, Wissam has returned to Lebanon to answer God’s call to serve the Church in the Middle East and North Africa. His commissioning capped a wonderful weekend that included a graduation ceremony with students from at least six different countries across the region and the celebration of 20 years of service by Dr. Elie Haddad, ABTS’s previous President. Christopher Hays and I both participated in these events, which marked new chapters for our friend Elie and for the school.

Almost 10 years ago, ABTS was one of the first schools to participate in our Vital Sustainability Initiative. When our team arrived on the ABTS campus in Beirut in 2016, two things stood out about the school. First, Elie was a gifted executive leader. Second, ABTS had a clear sense of mission as a servant of the Church across the Middle East. Guided by Elie’s oversight and that mission, we collaborated to establish clear objectives that ABTS could then pursue. 

Since those planning sessions, Lebanon has suffered several major crises: the collapse of its economy, the explosion at the Beirut port, the COVID pandemic, and war. To each of these challenges ABTS has adapted with innovation, perseverance, and faithfulness. For example, even before the COVID pandemic, ABTS saw online learning as a tool that could serve students across the MENA region. So when COVID hit, they were able to move classes online, a paradigm that they maintain today because it allows them to serve students in closed countries more effectively. In every crisis, they have continued not only to persevere but to thrive, in no small part because of extraordinary leadership. 

ABTS’s vision has enabled it to look beyond immediate crises to think about the long-term health of theology in the Middle East. In particular, they joined with the Evangelical Theological Seminary – Cairo and Bethlehem Bible College to launch a collaborative doctoral program to train Middle Eastern theologians in and for their home contexts, rather than sending them abroad. I helped to facilitate this first-of-its kind program for the MENA region, a project that is coming to fruition as the first cohort of doctoral students prepares to begin studies in the next few months.

Scholar Leaders has sought to walk alongside ABTS through all of these opportunities and challenges – perhaps, most importantly, by nurturing its leadership. When Elie recognized the need to strengthen his team and identified several younger leaders who would serve ABTS well, we invited them to apply for PhD scholarships through our Leader Studies program. So far, we have supported Walid Zailaa, an Old Testament scholar who now serves as Academic Dean, and Loulwa El Maalouf, who serves as ABTS’s Director of Partnerships. 

So we celebrated Elie’s retirement and Wissam’s commissioning with full hearts this September, as we continue to praise God for and to partner with ABTS in its commitment to the Church in the Middle East.