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Team player
becomes coach

Dr. John Wecks
fills a larger office this year

"The books were the main thing," John Wecks said about the rigors of moving his vast collection to the spacious office he now occupies as vice president and dean of Multnomah Biblical Seminary.

But Dr. Wecks, an avid sportsman, had a game plan: One seminary member positioned in his former office passed book stacks to a teammate, who then carried them into his new office. They finished the move in record time.

"He's a good team player, a good coach," seminary administrative assistant Marian O'Connor said. "He has a lot of enthusiasm, whether it be about his job, or the Blazers, or the Cowboys. I have great confidence in his leadership. He's the perfect fit for seminary dean."

Daniel Lockwood, Multnomah's new president, recommended Dr. Wecks as his successor last school year when phasing out of his position as seminary dean and vice president. Then-president Joseph Aldrich supported his proposal.

"Dr. Wecks is a good communicator, and he's well-organized," Dr. Lockwood said. "In working with him, he was always willing to go beyond the call of duty. He'd take extra teaching loads, do public-relations work for the school, do whatever needed to be done. He has a real passion for the vision of what the seminary is about."

Dr. Wecks' vision for the seminary includes adding a master of arts in pastoral studies program with an evangelism emphasis in coordination with the Luis Palau Evangelistic Association. And he hopes to offer an urban ministries degree in cooperation with local schools such as Western Seminary, Western Evangelical Seminary and Warner Pacific College.

His long-term seminary goals involve adding distance-learning alter-natives via the Internet and offering a doctorate of ministry as a natural culmination of the seminary's professional program.

"My upbringing, my church, my nine years of formal education," he said, "gave me a tremendous love for God's Word and a desire to pass that legacy on to as many people as I can."

Dr. Wecks, a Portland native, grew up the youngest of three children in a Christian home. His family attended Central Bible Church, where the Rev. John Mitchell, Multnomah's founder, dedicated Dr. Wecks as a baby.

In junior high, Dr. Wecks moved to Albany, Ore., where his father opened a concrete business. "They didn't know it," he said with a smile, "but it's clear to me that we moved there so I could meet Carley."

Dr. Wecks met his then-future wife, Carley, in English class at Albany Union High School.

"I'd heard from friends that he was a godly, Christian guy but didn't really know him," she said. "We had a class teaching assignment, and he taught on the mechanics of sail boating. His confidence and clarity of presentation impressed me."

Their relationship blossomed as they planned post-game gatherings through "Fifth Quarter," a high-school Christian organization that offered students a wholesome alternative to beer bashes.

"Carley's life and commitment to the Lord first attracted me to her," Dr. Wecks said. "Her sweet spirit that reflected her love for Christ. Second was her ability to think and problem solve. She has a very good mind."

They dated most of their high-school years and married in 1970 while Dr. Wecks was attending Multnomah, where his double major in Bible increased his reverence and love for God's Word.

After graduating in 1972, he pursued his master's degree in Bible Exposition in the English Bible at Dallas Theological Seminary.

In 1975, shortly after the birth of his first daughter, Joy, Dr. Wecks and a seminary classmate began co-pastoring Grand Prairie Bible Church. Its congregation, which consisted mostly of seminary students, Wycliffe missionaries and young couples, met in the multipurpose room at a local YMCA.

"Since it was a small church plant, we had our hands in everything," he said. "Working out the sound system, setting up chairs, planning worship, preparing and preaching the sermons, you name it."

For a time, Dr. Wecks also worked part time filing checks at the Bank of Dallas and grading Greek papers for a seminary professor. In addition, he and Mrs. Wecks managed apartments that rented for $22.50 a week in a rough Dallas district.

"I don't recommend this for everyone," he said, "but sometimes that's what you need to do to launch yourself into ministry."

The Wecks' second daughter, Jenny, was born in 1976, and two years later, Dr. Wecks assumed the role of senior pastor. "I liked the pastorate so much that I stayed 10 years," he said.

At home, the Wecks family dedicated time each evening to fun and creative devotionals. Dr. Wecks taught his grade-school daughters Bible study methods and, as the girls matured, facilitated frequent dinner-table dialogues on a broad range of topics.

"He's a great dad," Mrs. Wecks said. "He wants our children to think for themselves, not just parrot back ideas. He's very fair, very consistent. Both girls now have a strong walk with the Lord. They've seen ministry as a positive thing."

Although Dr. and Mrs. Wecks share fond memories of Grand Prairie, the final six months with the church were stressful. A Muslim family he led to Christ was nearly killed in an auto accident, the lives of a couple he was counseling were in a shambles, and an elder's daughter died of a brain tumor. The pressures of completing his doctoral work increased his anxiety.

"I'd grown to love these people so much," he said. "It all was a tremendous blow to me emotionally. I went through a time of discouragement, even depression over it. I'd always wanted to go into teaching, and I felt that the Lord was nudging me into

the field."

From 1984 to 1988, Dr. Wecks served as chairman of the department of pastoral theology and associate professor at Southeastern Bible College in Birmingham, Ala. In 1988, he returned to Multnomah as an assistant professor of Bible and pastoral ministries at the seminary.

Both scholar and sports fan, Dr. Wecks sometimes indulges in televised Saturday games, but limits himself to watching only their second half. On these afternoons, he sheds his academic mantle and settles into his easy chair with a heaping plate of nachos or a big bowl of rocky-road ice cream. He remains a die-hard Dallas Cowboys and Portland "Jailblazers" fan, he said, despite several team members' scrapes with the law.

But he's not just an armchair athlete. He has a passion for water sports and swims laps with his wife at a local pool on Tuesday and Thursday evenings. He also plays on-campus basketball with students and faculty during the lunch hour.

Dr. Garry Friesen, academic dean, said Dr. Wecks is a good athlete who is still in shape and runs the court well. "I always enjoy playing with him--except for the time my eye and his elbow met," he said with a chuckle.

Dr. Wecks' immediate off-court priority is renewing the seminary's full accreditation with the Association of Theological Schools, which will perform an on-campus evaluation March 1988. Filling three faculty positions and raising $2 million to build the seminary office classroom are also among his current projects.

"One of the fun things about moving into this office was [people saying], 'Don't you want to be seminary dean because then you'll have the biggest office on campus?'" he said. "When Dr. Lockwood moved, he went to a smaller office. Now he's remodeling, and his office is about the same size as mine. One of these days," he continued, a sly twinkle in his eyes, "I'll get a tape measure and compare."