Michael Barrett (theologian)

Michael Barrett, 2012

Michael Paul Vernon Barrett (born September 18, 1949) is Academic Dean and Professor of Old Testament at Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary and was formerly president of Geneva Reformed Seminary and an associate minister of Faith Free Presbyterian Church, Greenville, South Carolina, a congregation of the Free Presbyterian Church of North America.

Converted to Christianity as a child, Barrett was called to the Christian ministry early in his college career at Bob Jones University. He earned his doctorate in Old Testament Text at BJU with a special focus on Semitic languages.[1] For almost thirty years, he was professor of Ancient Languages and Old Testament Theology and Interpretation at BJU.[2]

Barrett assumed the presidency of Geneva Reformed Seminar in the fall of 2000. In the 2009 GRS bulletin, he emphasized his conviction that the seminary connect "head and heart—the intellect and devotion" and that it have an "unapologetic and uncompromising commitment to a Reformed theology that is Christ-centered, biblical, evangelistic, and separatist."[3]

Formerly a member of the Reformed Presbyterian Church, Evangelical Synod, Barrett helped to establish the Free Presbyterian Church in the United States during the late 1970s and 1980s and served for many years under the Rev. Dr. Alan Cairns in the Greenville assembly.[4] He is a member of the Evangelical Theological Society and the author of a half dozen books and numerous articles in both professional and popular religious journals.

In 2002, the conservative Baptist Bulletin recommended Barrett's Beginning at Moses to counter what it believed to be a common ignorance of Christ's presence in the Old Testament.[5] Of Barrett's Love Divine and Unfailing, Joel Beeke of Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary has written that it "is a clear, honest, panoramic treatment of the book of Hosea....a masterpiece in expounding God’s loving and gracious covenant [and] a sheer delight to read."[6] In 2009 R. Albert Mohler, Jr. listed the book as "one of the ten books every preacher should read this year."[7]

Barrett and his wife, Sandra, have two sons and five grandchildren. He is an avid hunter.[8]

Sources

  1. ↑ His dissertation concerned the translation techniques and philosophies of the Septuagint.
  2. ↑ Puritan Reformed Seminary website. On April 8, 2012, Barrett presented the reasons for his acceptance of his current post in a sermon available on SermonAudio.com, links to which are blocked by Wikipedia.
  3. ↑ GRS bulletin. "Knowledge without zeal is always dangerous; zeal without knowledge is potentially destructive."
  4. ↑ History of Faith Free Presbyterian Church.
  5. ↑ Baptist Bulletin (December 2002)
  6. ↑ Beeke review
  7. ↑ R. Albert Mohler, Jr., "The 2009 Preaching Survey of the Year's Best Books for Preachers," Preaching (March-April 2009), 14ff.
  8. ↑ Puritan Reformed Seminary website.

Books

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