Curry: Step by Step God Leads Me

Summer 1989

Reformed Quarterly Volume 8, Issue 2

How can you know God’s will for your life? It isn’t easy, but it is possible, as RTS professor Allen Curry has learned. Of his decision to become associate professor of Christian Education at RTS, he says, “I have never had such a firm conviction that this is what God wanted me to do.”

Such certainty has not always been his experience. God has surely led, but that guidance has been directly linked to Allen’s own spiritual growth.

Allen led a quiet and ordinary youth in Economy Township, a rural community in western Pennsylvania. But that changed dramatically when he was involved in an accident at the end of his junior year in high school. A friend, driving a pickup truck without permission, lost control and the truck turned over, leaving three severely traumatized but otherwise uninjured boys. The accident jarred Allen into reality, making him think more seriously about the purpose of life. “Even though we were able to walk away from it, this event caused me to think about the issues of life and death for the first time,” Allen remembers.

Although he had been raised in the church, Allen had never really understood the gospel. However, after the accident, God caused a seed planted in Allen’s life by a faithful Sunday school teacher to begin to grow. With his ears opened, the words he had been faithfully and lovingly taught began to make sense to him. This experience paved the way to spiritual understanding and growth and gave the future professor a lasting appreciation for Christian Education.

After high school, Allen wanted to travel and see the world; he was not the least bit excited about college. But he decided to try it at least for a year to please his father. To his pleasant surprise, however, Geneva College proved to be more eventful than he had anticipated. By the end of his freshman year, Allen began to grow emotionally, academically, and spiritually. He discovered, also to his amazement, that he enjoyed studying, something which later played a vital role in his career choice. During the last three years of college Allen participated in various campus activities, ran track (he’s still an avid jogger today), and was elected student body president in his senior year. He also met Marilyn, his future wife.

God placed Allen in the presence of other believers and used them to awaken his spiritual insight and interest. God also used faculty members and classmates to encourage his growth in grace. Bible reading and study deepened his spiritual understanding significantly.

At the end of his junior year of college, Allen had his first opportunity to preach in churches whose pastors were ill or out of town. God used these occasional pulpit experiences to expose Allen to the excitement and joy of preaching, the taste of which, combined with a growing inclination toward academics, directed his thoughts toward seminary.

Thus, little by little, Allen was discovering God’s direction for his life. After graduation from Geneva College in 1964, he spent the first of four summers serving as pastor’s assistant in several churches. In the fall, he entered Westminster Seminary.

The summer after his first year at Westminster, Allen and his new bride, Marilyn, went to work in Portland, Maine, where he gained valuable experience from his preaching opportunities and his work with the congregation. Most importantly, he learned that “the work of the pastorate requires not only study, but also the pursuit of godliness.”

The next summer Allen traveled to the opposite corner of the United States — San Diego, California. He preached regularly at the Paradise Hills Church and assisted in a church planting effort in nearby Point Loma, California. At the end of the summer he returned to Philadelphia with a growing inclination to pursue the pastoral ministry.

Upon graduation from Westminster, Allen served as a summer assistant in Wilmington, Delaware. Looking back, he can see that God was using all these experiences to direct his life decisions.

Of his summer ministries, Allen says, “They were all fantastic chances to learn. I was a temporary assistant who had many educational experiences but minimal responsibility.”

Largely due to the encouragement he received from seminary friends and the congregations he had served during the summer, Allen felt led by God to enter the pastoral ministry. When he completed his assignment in Wilmington, Delaware, he became pastor of Immanuel Orthodox Presbyterian Church in West Collingswood, New Jersey, near Philadelphia. He pastored this church for three years before deciding to pursue further education.

At Temple University Allen received his master’s and doctorate in education. During this time, Great Commission Publications hired him to serve as Director of Educational Services. This new job served as an avenue to use his abilities and interests and launched his career in Christian Education.

During his tenure with Great Commission Publications, Allen traveled as many as 50,000 miles a year by plane, conducting seminars in numerous regional conferences and in hundreds of churches around the country to provide training for teachers and other educational workers in the church.

Allen explains, “Great Commission Publications was committed to training people as well as furnishing them with the printed material. Publishing was only half the job. My two primary tasks were to train others how to teach and to help our editorial staff develop the kinds of materials teachers needed and wanted.”

After fifteen years as Director of Educational Services for Great Commission Publications, Allen was given the additional role of Coordinator of Production, a position which required him to supervise the planning, writing, editing and production of all GCP projects.

Allen’s extensive experience in training and publications will help RTS build an even stronger Christian Education department. He and RTS have a common vision: to prepare qualified educational workers for the church, to emphasize practical training for Christian Education, and to enable educators to promote the numerical and spiritual growth of the church.

Perhaps Allen’s greatest asset to RTS is the fact that he is a practitioner — for eighteen years he has taught people how to teach. He knows the art of teaching, which makes him uniquely capable to instruct students who plan to be Christian educators. As an added bonus, he recognizes quality curriculum and has developed ways to produce it.

His excitement about Christian Education is contagious. “Christian Education is one of the most important areas of the church,” he explains, “and usually involves more people than any other ministry. In a small church, fifty per cent of the congregation may be involved in education and music. It is usually the first place people look when they want to serve. We need to encourage this service, since I believe it is the hallmark of the Christian faith; to do that, we must equip these people to do their jobs well.”

Unfortunately, Allen has seen that Christian Education is often shortchanged in the church. Generally, it is not a high priority with ministers and other professional church workers; frequently ignorance about Christian Education is the culprit. According to Allen, seminary training in Christian Education has often been lacking or practically non-existent. That’s why he is excited about training seminarians as well as Christian educators. Helping RTS students learn the importance of Christian Education in the church and how to equip their congregations to teach will dramatically strengthen churches in the future.

” I want to get ministers excited about Christian Education. They struggle to find avenues for people to serve the Lord, while Christian education is the place where most people are serving.”

The future indeed looks bright for churches because of a capable professor like Allen Curry who will use his vast experience to revive an emphasis on Christian Education. We can be very glad he followed where God led.