(BJU) One semester before I would have graduated from BJU,

How this student rated the school

Educational Quality	C	Faculty Accessibility	B+
Useful Schoolwork	A	Excess Competition	C
Academic Success	B	Creativity/ Innovation	D
Individual Value	C	University Resource Use	C
Campus Aesthetics/ Beauty	B	Friendliness	C
Campus Maintenance	A+	Social Life	F
Surrounding City	D+	Extra Curriculars	C-
Safety	A+

Describes the student body as: Afraid, Snooty Describes the faculty as: Helpful

Male

ACT:31

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Quite Bright

Lowest Rating Social Life	F

Highest Rating Campus Maintenance	A+

He cares more about Social Life than the average student.

Date: Aug 24 2004
Major: Unknown (This Major's Salary over time)
One semester before I would have graduated from BJU, I was called into the dean's office and told that I was being denied reenrollment because they did not agree with the seminary I was planning to attend. They did not want their label "mixed" with another school's label with which they did not agree. This was in December 1982 and the school was Dallas Theological Seminary. By the way, I did not attend Dallas. Instead, I went to Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and loved it!

While I had good professors at BJU, the only permissible theology that was allowed to be taught was dispensationalism, which I believed in whole-heartedly at the time, even though I could never quite square it with Scripture. Pity the poor lad who came from a reform background. Pity the rest of us for not being given the opportunity to learn what reform theology was.

There are so many good Christian colleges out there that will challenge you to think about the Scriptures honestly and with integrity, that you don't really need to waste four years at BJU. If you desire to be indoctrinated, and come from a dispensational background, then you may do fine, rules and hypocrisy not withstanding. If you want to be stunted in your spiritual growth and educational pursuits, then by all means, go to BJU.

But if you want to learn in an environment that is faithful to orthodox understandings of the Scripture while also giving you an opportunity to understand other traditions within historic Christianity, then go somewhere else.

BJU will hurt you spiritually. It took several years to overcome the harmful effects of what we affectionately called "Jonestown." While I can appreciate what they are attempting to do, they are going about it in the wrong way. They have long since lost the founder's vision of what a truly Christian university can be and have morphed into a separtistic, high culture, ecclesiastical enclave that caters to independent, dispensational Baptists to the exclusion of all other Bible-believing Christians.

For those poor souls who actually buy into the beliefs and practices of BJU, they will forever be ostracized from normal Christian living, and lose all ability to influence their culture for Christ. I find it interesting to note that Bob Jones IV has escaped from his upbringing, having earned a Ph.D. from Notre Dame. I couldn't go to Dallas Theological Seminary but Bob Jones IV could go to Notre Dame. Fascinating.

Responses

No Kidding?! I wonder how Bobby the Fourth survived among those Satan-worshipping Papists? Prizeless! I wonder if the BJU students know about this!

Everyone should not be so quick to judge…I am SURE the family had their reasons for this decision…People don't know all the facts..they just speculate from what they think..I went to the academy I do know some of the facts regarding Bobby IV..let's leave it at that..somethings should just be left as the past..water under the bridge as some would say..I received a very good education, but would I send my child there…NO! Very sheltered beliefs…does not give room for a person to develop themself as an individual…just what the school wants to make of the person..kinda like little robots!

I (in the first response above) was talking sarcastically - poking fun at BJU'S bigotted views, not agreeing with them!

Many students do know about Bob Jones IV leaving BJU. I left BJU several years ago due to financial set-backs, majoring in special education; however now I am enrolled through Vincennes University seeking a certifciation in American Sign Language and am involved twice a month at a Deaf Church, and will be involved more when schooling starts! Irregardless of BJU's erroneous assumption that Conventional traditionalism and Dispensation Theology are correct avenues to God; God is doing a mighty work in my life.

The thing I learned the most from BJU is to let God be the Lord of your life, not your school.

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Bobby Jones (IV) was expelled when I was a freshman in 1983/84 and he was a high school senior. He had sneaked off campus and was caught drinking alcohol. He was sent to live with relatives. That was the last we heard of him. I saw he was writing for World magazine years later. I lived his articles in that magazine. I saw BJ IV as intelligent and not moldable into the traditional BJU mold. I didn't mold too well either and did not return for my sophomore year.

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