Robert Orner

Dr. Robert H. (Bob) Orner is the Dean of Students at Reformed Theological Seminary’s Orlando campus. Orner joined the staff of RTS Orlando in August 2010 as a guest lecturer in practical theology, associate director of the Doctor of Ministry program, and director of field education. He received his bachelor’s degree from Columbia International University, and his master of divinity and doctorate of ministry degrees from RTS Orlando. As an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church in America denomination, Orner has more than 25 years of experience in church mnistry. He has served as a youth pastor, senior pastor, church planter and director of training for Global Church Advancement. He has helped start several church planting networks and continues to serve as a part-time church planting coach, consultant and trainer. Living in Nairobi, Kenya, though his teenage years built within Orner a love and appreciation for cultural, ethnic and socioeconomic diversity. God used these years to develop in him a passion to equip leaders for the global community who are biblically and theologically grounded, gospel motivated and culturally intelligent. Orner led a two-year Lilly Endowment-funded study in cooperation with Covenant Seminary Center for Ministry Leadership that focused on church planting in the African American and Hispanic contexts in North America. He continues to study, write and lecture on the topics of cultural intelligence. Bob and his wife Chris have been married for 25 years, and have one son, Taylor, a senior at Winter Park High School.