“We can situate what the Spirit does in who the Spirit is:” Alex Wendel at LATC 2025

Los Angeles Theology Conference is officially not an interdisciplinary conference. An important part of our brand has always been sharply focusing on the discipline of theology, and on topics that are immediately recognizable as doctrinal. Even our participants who are trained in philosophy, biblical studies, and history—and we’ve had lots of them—are game to step up to theological subject matter proper for LATC. The distinction may not always by precise, but in an age when (it seems to me) most academic theology gatherings tend toward “theology and x,” LATC has an intentional focus on “theology, period.”

But all truth is connected, theologians consider doctrines across all sorts of boundaries, and of course theology’s remit is to study all things in light of God. So an intentional focus on doctrine will always bring with some exceptions and borderline cases. The 2025 conference on applied soteriology has a couple of contributions that benefit from the best kind of dual expertise. Which brings us to the contribution of Alex Wendel, who is Director of Clinical Training and professor of counseling at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary.

Q: LATC 2025’s theme is Receiving Redemption, and it focuses on how salvation is received by human persons and communities. Why did this aspect of soteriology catch your attention and make you propose a paper on it?

A: So, my “day job” is being the Director of Clinical Training for the graduate counseling program at NOBTS which means that theology could be considered what I moonlight in.  However, theology really is the foundation of all of what I do as someone who helps train people to help other people. So, when the subject of how salvation is received by human persons and even communities comes up, I really begin to think about my work as a counselor and how that work relates to the work of the Wonderful Counselor. I know that is a bit of a cliche but it really is fundamental to what I envision the task of counseling to be. Of course, it is the Spirit who gives life, but the role of a counselor can be a mighty and wonderful one in helping people to work through trauma, grief, anxiety, etcetera, to be able to live out their salvation. Counseling is never going to take the place of sanctification, that is certainly the Spirit’s role. But I do think that counselors (and theologians) need to understand and utilize the Holy Spirit to be able to best help people receive salvation and then live their lives out of that truth. Understanding that we can situate what the Spirit does in who the Spirit is provides a helpful starting place for how we approach other topics that help to inform the task of counseling as well. 

Q: The title of your paper is “What’s Love Got To Do With It? The Procession of the Spirit and the Reception of Redemption.” How will you be approaching the conference theme in this paper?

A: My paper title sounds better if you sing the first part. My paper is pretty related to the answer above. I want to continue examining how understanding the Holy Spirit as the Love between the Father and the Son helps us to realize that it is this same Spirit of Love that enables us to pursue holiness and happiness as well. One of the main tasks in doing this, however, is to not end up taking the name of the Spirit in vain and making the Spirit do something the Spirit is not inherently able or supposed to be doing. This is why locating the work of the Spirit, as Love, within the Trinity is an important first step. That we do not have to force the Spirit to teach us about love is really a wonderful gift. In receiving this Gift of Love, we are also equipped to love God and love others. I think this argument is not new, as will be discussed in the paper, but I do hope to situate the argument into a different context to make it a concern of practical theology. Who knew that Trinitarian Processions would help make us better counselors, theologians, and just people overall? Well, God did I suppose.

Q: Can you describe how this paper fits in with your previous theological work, or with your recent scholarship?

A: Like I have said a few times, theology is not my major discipline (except that it REALLY is when I think about my role as a counselor and now a counselor educator). A lot of my work to date has been about positive psychology, the Virtues, and how we can approach the virtue tradition from a Christian perspective to actually instill and maintain wellness in counselors (a profession with a high rate of burn out). I have done some work in the area of trauma as well with my first publication being about trauma and theological method. Overall, though I do feel like this paper (and its related projects) really is the culmination of a lot of these threads being pulled together into one question: how does the Spirit give life? Because it is this life that Spirit gives that people who have endured trauma need to have. It is this life that the Spirit gives that is positively more positive for human flourishing than Positive Psychology could ever offer. And it is this life that the Spirit gives that we all need – regardless of discipline – to be able to not just function in our professions but to possibly flourish as well. 

Q: What are you looking forward to at the conference? Are there any papers or theological issues that have especially caught your eye?

A: Even though this conference is not about this and his paper is not about it, I do want to talk to Andrew Davison about aliens… but I will do that outside of conference proceedings. Maybe. But really, I am excited to get to meet with a solid set of talented and intelligent theologians to talk about a deeply important topic. To be a bit personal about it, I am feeling quite blessed to be able to have a theological paper presented at a theology conference with actual theologians even though I am “just a counselor.” It feels affirmative in a major way to know that my little side-quests into theological studies have proved effective. Related to that, I am just excited to continue learning both from other’s papers but also in getting feedback on my own little slice of the conference with my paper.