(ORLANDO, Fla.)-January 9, 2017 – Chancellor Ligon Duncan and the Board of Trustees Reformed Theological Seminary are pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Scott R. Swain as the fifth president of the Orlando campus. “I am thrilled that Dr. Scott Swain has agreed to become the President of RTS Orlando,” Duncan said. “Scott has served RTS for over a decade, and his leadership as Academic Dean has made a tremendous, positive impact on our Orlando campus already. He is recognized by his peers as an outstanding scholar. He is a superb teacher, a prolific author, a wise leader, a faithful husband and father, and a committed churchman. As a native Floridian he will bring a significant insight and perspective to his new role. Scott brings a unique set of gifts. Many things stand out to me about him, one is that as a leader he has an eye for people’s potential and giftedness. He also inspires his co-laborers’ confidence and loyalty (which tells you something about how he treats people).”
Dr. Swain’s decade-long tenure at RTS Orlando has been distinguished in numerous ways. He joined the faculty in 2006 after several years of teaching at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and he served for several years as Assistant and later Associate Professor of Systematic Theology. In fall 2012 he took on administrative duties as Academic Dean, and his service in that role involved the addition of three new faculty members. In 2015 he was promoted to the rank of Professor of Systematic Theology.
A native of Jacksonville, Florida, Swain attended the University of North Florida (B.A.), Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary (M.Div. and Th.M.), and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (Ph.D.), where he studied under leading theologian Kevin Vanhoozer. He is an ordained teaching elder in the Presbyterian Church in America. He and his wife, Leigh, have four children.
Dr. Swain has garnered a distinguished reputation as a theologian in recent years. The fruit of his doctoral study has since been published as The God of the Gospel (IVP Academic). His other books are (with Andreas Kostenberger) Father, Son, and Spirit (IVP Academic), Trinity, Revelation, and Reading (T & T Clark), and (with Michael Allen) Reformed Catholicity (Baker Academic) and Christian Dogmatics (Baker Academic). In the last year, he delivered plenary addresses at both the Evangelical Theological Society’s annual meeting and the Los Angeles Theology Conference. With Allen, he edits two significant series in theology and exegesis: Zondervan Academic’s New Studies in Dogmatics and the T & T Clark International Theological Commentary series.
According to Chancellor Duncan, Swain “embodies the RTS aspiration to be winsomely Reformed. He is a man of definite convictions and wide associations. At RTS, we espouse a happy confessionalism that speaks from a positive Reformed commitment, but which aims to serve all of the evangelical world. This is one reason that so many different denominations are reflected in the RTS student body. Scott exemplifies this in his own vocation as a theologian, and so is the perfect person to continue and articulate this emphasis at RTS Orlando. I count Scott as a dear friend and trusted colleague, and can’t wait to serve RTS together with him in his new role.”
Dr. Swain’s inauguration service is scheduled for September 20, 2017.