Amy Clackum has been pursuing a Master of Divinity (MDiv) degree at Yellowstone Theological Institute since the spring of 2025. Married for twenty-three years,Amy and her husband Nathan have one daughter. As a self-trained minister on staff at various church and parachurch organizations for the past twenty years, Amy has long wanted to expand her educational horizons beyond reading books, listening to podcasts, and attending conferences. She says, “I wanted to grow in foundational, real information, not just [learning from] somebody else who may or may not have a degree teaching about a subject.”
When her husband was offered a dream job in Bozeman—resulting in a family relocation—Amy assumed she’d have to wait to fulfill her hopes for continuing theological education until she heard from a YTI faculty member who preached at her church. Amy liked what she learned about YTI and its programs, and she was determined to find a way to make a class a term work for her family. However, in the application process, Amy learned that YTI is both affordable and offers scholarships, which made attending an “easy yes” for her. Amy concludes her scholarship “provides in such a way that it doesn’t take away from what our family needs right now, but it’s also fulfilling a dream.”
Amy feels a pastoral call to ministry and wants to be equipped “to sit with people really well, to care for people really well, and to help grow them.” She observes that there is a disconnect between how people live and what they know about the Bible. Amy believes helping those she ministers to learn to live out of biblical truth will have direct impacts on how they view the world, how they see other people, and how they care about topics from immigration to LGBTQIA concerns.
Amy was raised in a Christian home, yet she found it didn’t take root for her until her twenties when she was convicted about life choices and determined to pursue her relationship with God. Now, Amy finds that the first place her studies are having an impact is in family life. Growing in understanding the narrative arc of the Biblical story has also removed fear around facing some of those unanswerable questions that people ask, like “why do bad things happen to good people?” and reminded her that what’s behind those questions is usually something else like a hurt or wounding. She finds she sees people in a loving way that’s different than it used to be.
Other things Amy values about YTI include the accessibility of programs—offered online and in-person, the opportunity to connect with faculty and staff with a broad variety of perspectives, educational backgrounds, and experiences, and the opportunity to pursue an education that is designed to foster the whole person.
Amy isn’t only expanding her knowledge in academic areas; she finds that she is growing as a follower of Christ personally. Concepts and practices that Amy thought were “slam dunks” in her life, are blossoming as she engages with them in deeper ways. She says the church doesn’t pay a lot of attention to spiritual practices such as meditation, silence, solitude, being in creation. As she explores those things she thought she understood and those things she didn’t have much experience with, she recognizes that “God is so big and he just keeps getting bigger” which makes her feel small, “but in a good way, not an insignificant way.”