Who We Are

There exists a wide gulf between Sunday School and Seminary. Sunday School is enriching. Seminary is vital for the health of the Church. But Sunday School can be scatter-shot and Seminary is too expensive for an average layperson.

Warfield Summer Institute exists to stand in this gap. We desire to equip Christians in a structured and lively learning environment for deeper knowledge of God’s Word, greater love of Jesus our Savior, and steadier commitment to serve Christ’s kingdom.

Our mission is to build up the body of Christ in its knowledge of the faith and love for the Savior (Eph. 4:12-13) by equipping Christians to rightly handle God’s Word for themselves, the Church, and their neighbors.

Our vision sees men and women increasing in their knowledge of the inspired Word of God to grow in an “enlargement of heart, elevation of spirit, and adoring delight in the Maker and Savior” (B.B. Warfield, The Religious Life of Theological Students) for kingdom service, mission, and further learning.

Our approach provides learners with a structured program of study in a classroom environment. Our program will move learners through three stages: Foundation, Construction, and Expression. Courses in the Foundation stage will teach the grammar of the discipline. Courses in the Construction stage will connect the dots and dive a little deeper. Courses in the final stage, Expression, will provide ways to apply learning in the context of the Church.

“...building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ... ”
— Ephesians 4:12-13

Why Warfield?

We are named for Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield (1851-1921) the “lion of Princeton.” B.B. Warfield, as a Professor at Princeton Theological Seminary from 1887 to 1921, fought diligently for the inspiration and authority of the Bible when so many adapted their belief to the growing modernism of the day.

A great theologian of “Old Princeton,” his theology began in thorough exegesis of the scriptures and was applied to the concerns of the Church. His lively confessional theology was also illustrated in his care for students, teaching his classes to the very last day of his life, and his care for his invalid wife, caring for her faithfully to the last day of her life.

B.B. Warfield is just a man, but a wonderful example to us of one who knew the faith, loved the Savior, and served the Kingdom. Learn more about B.B. Warfield here.

Faculty and Staff

  • John Canavan

    EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR AND INSTRUCTOR IN THEOLOGY

    Rev. Canavan serves full-time as the Chair of the Bible Department at Westminster School at Oak Mountain in Birmingham, AL. He is ordained as a Teacher of the Word in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. John has served churches and schools in Pennsylvania, Missouri, Virginia, and Alabama. He was raised at the historic Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia where he later led college ministry. John holds a B.A. in English Literature from Temple University and a M.Div. from Covenant Theological Seminary. He is currently working on his Th.M. at Covenant expecting to complete a thesis in 2025 on Paul’s Pastoral Work Ethic in the Corinthian Correspondence. John and his wife Sharon have two precocious daughters, Emma and Sophie. They attend Third PCA in downtown Birmingham.

  • Luke Gossett

    INSTRUCTOR IN BIBLICAL STUDIES

    Rev. Gossett returns home to Birmingham to serve as Church Planter of Birmingham Reformed Church in the summer of 2023. He is ordained in the United Reformed Church in North America and formerly served as Associate Pastor at Christ Reformed (URCNA) in Washington, D.C. Luke earned a B.A. from Southeastern Bible College in Birmingham, an M.A. from Westminster Seminary California, an M.A. in Semitic Languages from Catholic University of America, and he is presently working on a Ph.D. in Semitic Languages from Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. He and his wife Jennifer have two wonderful children, Cecilia and Cohen.

  • David Grubbs

    INSTRUCTOR IN GREAT BOOKS

    Dr. Grubbs serves full-time as a Humanities and Rhetoric Teacher at Westminster School at Oak Mountain in Birmingham, AL. Previously, David taught humanities in Christian college settings in Kansas and Texas. David earned a B.A. in Biblical Studies and Humanities at Southeastern Bible College, an M.A. in English Literature from University of Alabama at Birmingham, and a Ph.D. in English from the University of Georgia. David’s Ph.D. dissertation observed Patristic Theology in Beowulf. David is married with four children and attends The Church at Brook Hills.

  • Madeleine Mote

    MARKETING AND SOCIAL MEDIA INTERN

    Miss Mote is an Alabama native and a recent graduate of Pennsylvania State University with a B.S. in Marketing. She also completed an Associates Degree in Christian Studies from Highlands College in Birmingham, AL. She will be helping us grow our digital presence and practicing her learned skills in marketing this Summer.

Board of Directors

  • Chad Walker, President

    Rev. Walker is Associate Pastor of Adult Ministries at Oak Mountain Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Birmingham, AL. Before seminary, Chad worked in finance and then ministry with Campus Outreach in Alabama, also serving as a Ruling Elder in his local PCA congregation. Chad then attended Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis earning his M.Div. in 2017. After seminary, Chad moved back to Alabama to work at Oak Mountain Presbyterian Church. Chad and his wife Emily have been married for almost two decades and have four boys, Keller, Owen, Lawson, and Shepp.

  • Chris Pursell, Vice-President and Treasurer

    Dr. Pursell is Professor and Chair of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Samford University in Birmingham, AL. Before joining Samford’s faculty, Chris was a chemistry professor at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, for 26 years. He is the author or co-author of numerous articles in his field. He has a B.S. from California State University-Sacramento and a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. Chris has been married to Kathy for nearly four decades. They have three married children and seven grandkids. Chris also serves as a Ruling Elder at Third (PCA) in downtown Birmingham.

  • David Smith, Secretary

    Rev. Dr. Smith is Pastor of Covenant Fellowship ARP Church and Dean of the Upper School at Bradford Academy in the Greensboro, NC area. He has pastored churches and taught High School in various states, and served on numerous presbytery and denominational committees. He is currently an adjunct professor at Erskine Seminary. He completed his M.Div. at Covenant Theological Seminary and his Ph.D. in historical theology from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. His doctoral dissertation on B. B. Warfield was published in the Evangelical Theological Society’s Monograph Series and he is co-author of Old School, New Clothes: The Cultural Blindness of Christian Education. He has been married to his wife, Tracy, for nearly three decades and they are the parents of three young adults, Gresham, Isaac, and Katherine.

 FAQs

  • Birmingham, AL has many churches but increasingly fewer who know the Bible and Christian theology with depth. Therefore, those that wish to take a step beyond a typical Bible study into a classroom environment will grow in their knowledge, love, and service for Christ and his kingdom. WSI is not for pastors or seminarians (although it may be a good pre-seminary program) but Christian laypeople, ministry leaders, and church officers (Ruling Elder and Deacon) of all walks of life, especially those that treasure Reformed Presbyterian Theology.

  • These institutions predominately serve “insiders” at the graduate level, those who will or already are serving in formal, professional ministry. Likewise, they serve those that already are reading and thinking on theological topics at an advanced level. WSI aims to serve the average layperson who does not necessarily intend to work full-time in ordained, or even vocational, ministry. However, some may desire to work in the church and WSI would adequately equip the ministry director or church officer. Additionally, the WSI coursework would compare more accurately with an undergraduate program and could, instead, be seen as preparation for (not replacement of) graduate study at one of these fine institutions.

  • Sunday School ministry at your local church is certainly a wonderful thing and helpful to all the saints. But Sunday School does not often grant you a systematic, structured approach to your learning. It is often scatter-shot. Typically, your Sunday School class consists of disjointed book studies and speakers’ hobbyhorses. WSI seeks to provide a foundational, comprehensive, and organized system of learning for each participant. At WSI we hope to train those who would teach Sunday School or desire to benefit from Sunday School more consistently.

  • Visit our admissions page to learn more. You’ll need to fill out a basic application and pay an application fee to be admitted for either credit or audit.

  • Only if you want to! You can register to be held accountable by tests or papers that will receive feedback from your instructor and a course grade by registering “for credit.” It is the only way to receive our certificate of completion. But not everyone wants to go back to school to that extent. So, there is an auditing option at registration that is cheaper and does not require you to turn in work for grading. However, you cannot earn our certificate of completion by auditing courses. Whether you audit or take the course with graded course work, you will be immersed into an interactive classroom environment to encourage formative learning, not just information gathering.

  • Textbooks are assigned carefully and suggested reading plans are given to every student for your benefit. Those that are taking the course with graded work will be required to read. Those that audit would self-select into their level of reading completion. Each classroom would benefit, however, from full participation in the reading material that is discussed in class.

  • Each instructor is a qualified teacher of the Word of God and books from Historical Theology, with at least a Master’s degree from an accredited and reputable university, divinity school, or seminary. Likewise, instructors must submit and subscribe to the beliefs described in a Reformed Confessional standard, like the Westminster Standards or the Three Forms of Unity. On top of this, most teachers in theology and Biblical Studies will be ordained teaching elders in NAPARC churches.