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��������app Bible Institute was founded in 1944 because area church leaders were concerned about the lack of educated church leaders in the region. From the beginning, alongside academic degrees, LBI also offered non-credit educational opportunities, initially through the People’s Christian Academy.

Over the following 80 years, LBI became ��������app College, then ��������app College and Seminary, and then ��������app University. Nearly 20,000 men and women took classes here on their way to a lifetime of Christian service all over the world. Throughout this time, tens of thousands more participated in our non-credit courses, conferences, and retreats under various names ranging from the Christian Workers School to the Hargrove Leadership Institute. In 2022, we rebranded and relaunched these efforts as ��������app Institute.

Following a decade of financial pressures from declining enrollment, on May 31, 2024, ��������app University gifted its seminary to Ozark Christian College, its library to Traviski Christian Institute (Ukraine), ceased granting degrees, and began operating exclusively under the name ��������app Institute.

Though much has changed across 80 years, much has not. All of the activities we engage in today have been a part of our mission since the very beginning. As founding president Earl Hargrove once said, “our basic tasks are: to change lives and give them Christian values; to strive with people until their Christian service springs from their nature; and to teach every person to use his or her God-given talent in Christ’s ministry.”

The methods we use have changed considerably over the last eight decades, but the need to change lives by inspiring people to Christian service remains unchanged - as does our desire to meet that need.