It is with great excitement that I welcome you to New Hope Bible College. What could be more wonderful and stimulating to your heart and mind than the Holy Scriptures? I know that you hunger to dig into Scripture and to see how you can better fulfill your individual calling. It makes me think of the “noble” Bereans in Acts 17:11 “who examined the Scriptures with great eagerness.”
Having enjoyed a career in education for twenty-three years, I am very eager to see the emergence of a school which can make an essential difference in this world. We have the Word of God, and it is our solemn duty to deliver it to the world with great carefulness. It is powerful and it is our Weapon against the existing ungodliness which is pervading the globe. Secular education involves a career; the Lord’s work involves a “calling.” That is a very important difference.
With studies stating that up to 70 percent of our nation’s people are not even attending a church, it is now more important to sharpen our tools and “make fool proof of our ministry”
(II Tim 4:5). The central focus of the college is 1) to prepare ministers for licensure, 2) to provide continuing education for pastors, and 3) to provide continuing education for lay persons in your church who are in leadership roles.
With this in mind, the preparation offered at NHBC will center on the Bible as the main Textbook, and our driving force will be the motto: “Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel” (Mark 16:15-17).
As I close, I would like to give you a positive word from Scripture: “For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you A HOPE and a future” (Jeremiah 29:11). I want us to reach this world with “the renewing power of the Word of God”. Do not accept the sadness and emptiness of the world, and say, “That’s just the way it is…” Let’s do something about it. The “technology” of this world has reached inside the walls of our churches, but technology does not heal; God’s Word is the ONLY HOPE.
Thank you for your consideration of New Hope Bible College.
Dr. Raquel Sugimoto, Vice-President and Co-founder
M.A., Christian Education, Doctor of Biblical Studies