Westmont Magazine New Martin Institute Director Encourages People to Live and Love Like Jesus Did

“I’m increasingly convinced that the Martin Institute — and efforts like it — are exactly what we need today,” says Steve L. Porter, the new senior research fellow and executive director of Westmont’s Martin Institute for Christianity and Culture. “Cultural, ecclesial, historical and psychological factors keep Christians from consistently living out the kind of life Jesus came to offer, and the church and world are in crisis because of it.”

Inspired by the work of the late Dallas Willard, the Martin Institute seeks to support a new generation of leaders in Christian spiritual formation and to help establish this field as a domain of publicly available knowledge open to research and pedagogy of the highest order.

“Willard taught that every major religion, school of philosophy and political arrangement has to answer two fundamental questions: What does it mean to live a good life? and How does one become a good person?” Porter says. “The mission of the Martin Institute is helping people clearly articulate, compellingly practice and intelligently demonstrate the unparalleled wisdom of Jesus’ answers to those questions.”

Of course, Jesus not only addressed these questions in his teaching — he embodied his answers in his earthly life. “The goal is to enter into the overall way of life Jesus exemplified, which seeks above all else the reign of God,” Porter says. “Westmont is an ideal scholarly community where we can learn together from Jesus and his people down through the ages how to live and love like he did.”

The Martin Institute pursues four initiatives.

• Incarnatio, a center on campus, focuses on developing the whole person and supporting Westmont students in their spiritual and character formation. Mariah Velasquez, associate director for the Martin Institute, leads the center.

• The Dallas Willard Research Center under the direction of Mark Nelson, Monroe professor of philosophy, honors the legacy of Willard by promoting scholarship on Christian spiritual formation.

• Gary Moon, founding director of the Martin Institute, leads Conversatio Divina, which curates resources in spiritual formation for leaders and lay people.

• Michael Di Fuccia oversees Cultura, a fellowship program for emerging leaders who desire to cultivate a spiritual formation paradigm personally, relationally and professionally.

“Through these initiatives, we attempt to help Christians actually look more like Christ,” Porter says. “This multidisciplinary effort demonstrates realistic and reliable pathways to be conformed to the image of Christ.”

Porter graduated from Biola University, Talbot School of Theology, the University of Oxford and the University of Southern California. He earned his doctorate in philosophy at USC under the supervision of Dallas Willard. Porter spent the last 19 years teaching at Biola’s Talbot School of Theology and Rosemead School of Psychology. He has served as managing editor or editor of the “Journal of Spiritual Formation and Soul Care” since 2008. Steve and his wife, Alicia, live with their two teenage children, Luke and Siena, and their chocolate Labrador, Ranger.