The Class of 1964: Celebrating 50 Years of Ministry

The Class of 1964 Anointing
the Class of 2014 at Senior
Chapel Held on May 17, 2014

Let’s take a minute and set the time machine for 1964. Nelson Mandela is sentenced to life imprisonment in South Africa. President Johnson declares “war on poverty” and introduces federal welfare programs including Medicare. Three civil rights workers are murdered in Mississippi during “freedom summer.” Race riots break out in Harlem and other U.S. cities. The Warren Commission determines that Oswald acted alone. The cost of a first class stamp is a nickel. Color television makes its way into U.S. living rooms. Pop Tarts came out and Nehru jackets are “in” and the Ford Mustang is introduced to the public at the New York World’s Fair.

That same year, Evangelical Theological Seminary (ETS) and Garrett Biblical Institute (GBI) sent graduates out in the spring to a world eager for good news. These graduates began repairing churches, strengthening churches, and healing church communities. Their ministry took them into prisons, college campuses, and onto battle fields. They served in funeral homes and homes for unwed mothers. They became fundraisers, probation officers, financial counselors, and marriage counselors. They administrated in college admission offices, directed youth camps, marched into Montgomery with Martin Luther King, Jr., slogged through Nicaraguan jungles, taught high school dance, and wrote comic strips. Some went on to pursue additional degrees. Women pastors opened doors for more women pastors. There were radio shows to host and newspaper columns, books, prayers, and poetry to write. As one member of the class wrote, "The theme of what I have been doing can be expressed this way: with many fits and failures, as well as many rewarding moments, I have been attempting to show the Grace of Christ with them, always.”

Today we see they are retired and rewired. We find them pastoring to shut-ins, planting gardens, still repairing churches, taking piano lessons, ushering for art performances, and coaching pastors. While some are hunting for deer and elk others are collecting tools, writing short stories, playing bridge, and still drawing cartoons.

They want to read more books, visit more shut-ins, and continue to have a life of meaning. They want to travel, they want to stay home, they want to enjoy family. They will fiddle with electric railroad trains, study the stars, play golf, sell used books, climb Mt. Everest, visit China, lead spiritual growth workshops, visit cousins in Alaska and nephews in London, cruise the Danube, and plan to live to see their grandchildren graduate.

You can read even more about the members of the Class of 1964 in the Golden Anniversary Memory Book, found below. And may the very best keep coming for the Garrett Theological Seminary and Evangelical Theological Seminary Class of 1964.