Since 2010, Ellerslie Training has raised the bar for Bible training programs in the United States by not only establishing a series of content that illuminates the Scripture, but by creating a unique environment that wholly supports the Christian student in their study and pursuit of Jesus Christ.
Interviewing Experts: Hello – so glad to have you with us on this beautiful morning.
Ellerslie Training: We certainly are grateful to have this opportunity to talk with you about our training program!
Interviewing Experts: The thing that intrigues me most about your training is your campus environment. Could you briefly mention what makes it so unique.
Ellerslie Training: First off, it’s a gorgeous site. Colorado, just by itself, is amazing. But our location is something quite special. We are located near the foot of the Rocky Mountains in charming little Windsor, Colorado. We are nestled up next to a lake and, though we are only minutes away from any all conveniences, it really does feel like we are out in the boonies.
Interviewing Experts: Could you tell us about the philosophy Ellerslie Training has regarding its campus atmosphere?
Ellerslie Training: We believe that a great training program needs three key things. 1) Great content, 2) Great delivery of that content, and 3) A great environment in which that great content and great training can prosper and thrive. I don’t know which of these three elements is most difficult. At first glance, “atmosphere” would seem the easiest. But, creating a guarded, set-apart atmosphere here at Ellerslie has proven a massive undertaking. One that has been very worthwhile and rewarding.
Interviewing Experts: Tell me about the other two elements you just mentioned – content and delivery. How have you accomplished excellence in these arenas?
Ellerslie Training: I think all of us here at Ellerslie Training would shy away from claiming any credit in the fact that this program has succeeded. It has truly been a work of grace. In many ways, we feel like we have built the plane while flying it. But, from the beginning we had a world class curriculum and we had communicators that people would travel from around the world to sit under. Combine that with our campus environment and you have a pretty good working model.
Interviewing Experts: How does your content stand out from other Bible training programs?
Ellerslie Training: Every good Bible training program uses the Bible as its base. We can’t improve upon that and certainly don’t want to. Where we have excelled, I believe, is in our approach. Our organization of our Biblical material has proven tremendously successful in stirring the hearts and minds of our students. Nine weeks at Ellerslie Training is truly life-changing, and our content has a lot to do with that.
Interviewing Experts: What do you mean by life-changing?
Ellerslie Training: Our students really do come out the other side of the Ellerslie Training living different, thinking different, talking different, and handling temptation different. Everything is affected, from eating and drinking, to romance, to finances, to their very purpose here on earth. Many Christians today esteem Jesus Christ, but they don’t really know what the Bible says. When you take nine weeks and actually hear Christ’s words and start heeding them – it alters you . . . completely!
Interviewing Experts: So, if I was a student and I was just arriving on campus. It’s day one at Ellerslie Training – what am I thinking?
Ellerslie Training: Our environment is quite dignified. It’s like Oxford without all the ornate buildings, pipe tobacco, and british accents. So, when new students arrive, it is a bit surreal. The first thing they realize is that we are not joking about the serious of maintaining our atmosphere. Alot of our students have acknowledged that their knees were knocking a bit when they were getting dressed up for the opening night’s banquet. But, somewhere during the banquet they usually start to relax. From the first day onward, the experience here in Windsor, Colorado is what we refer to here at Ellerslie Training as “serious fun”.
Interviewing Experts: From where did the discipleship curriculum of Ellerslie Training originate?
Ellerslie Training: Eric Ludy spent about six years developing it from 2004 to 2010. As a highly regarded leader in the Christian world today, Eric’s investment in this training, really lent it a great degree of credibility from the very beginning. When we opened our doors for our first semester of training in 2010, we had a curriculum of over 1200 pages that caused our inaugural class to marvel at its epic thematic infrastructure intermixed with its practical poignancy.
Interviewing Experts: In recent years, how has the Ellerslie Training program been adapted and refined?
Ellerslie Training: Eric Ludy always uses the word “Kaizen”. It’s a Japanese word that means “constant improvement”. In a nutshell, that is the key philosophy behind our ongoing approach to our training model. We are always thinking, “let’s kaizen” that. Every semester lends us yet another opportunity to do this even better. So, since the beginning, we have been constantly changing, constantly adapting our model to maximize its effectiveness in our student’s lives.
Interviewing Experts: How are your students empowered to take this knowledge and insight along with them when they leave Ellerslie?
Ellerslie Training: Our parent organization is Ellerslie Mission Society. So, at Ellerslie Training we are very interested in the “going home” portion of our training. As a “mission society” we send people into the world – that’s just what we do. So, when it comes to students going back to their homes, their colleges, their workplaces, we want to make the hand-off as clean as possible. We want to see that they really do have a grip on that baton. When it comes to our “constant improvement” philosophy – this particular arena of the Ellerslie Training program is probably one of the most important to us.
Interviewing Experts: Why is it so critical?
Ellerslie Training: Biblical discipleship is simply not Biblical discipleship unless that hand-off is secure and effective. We are not doing what we do to hear ourselves talk, but to effectively inculcate the Truth of Jesus Christ into the hearts and minds of our students.
Interviewing Experts: Thank you for making this Ellerslie training available.
Ellerslie Training: It really is our pleasure. We truly love what we do.
Ellerslie Training was founded and is led by best-selling author and pastor Eric Ludy.
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