Professional Dissertations DMin

Date of Award

1987

Document Type

Project Report

Degree Name

Doctor of Ministry

College

Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary

Program

Doctor of Ministry DMin

First Advisor

Norman K. Miles

Second Advisor

Garth D. Thompson

Third Advisor

Walter B. T. Douglas

Abstract

This project was designed to develop a program of instruction for training layman in their personal Christian witnessing to the Muslims of Indonesia. The lay people involvement is very important at this time. Sharing Christian witnessing is a challenge to the lay people of Indonesia. They need to give their countrymen the good news of Jesus Christ. They need instruction to equip them for this great and rewarding service. The first chapter reviews passages from Scripture and from the writings of Ellen G. White about the functions of lay people in the church. The participation of the laity in the ministry of the Gospel is necessary to fulfill Christ's command. Representative contemporary literature was reviewed to examine its explication of Scripture. It emerged that the primary task of the pastors, evangelists, prophets, and teachers is to train the lay people for the ministry of the Gospel.

Chapter 2 draws attention to the need to understand the culture and social mores of the people in order for Christian witnessing to be most effective. The work of Christians— especially the Seventh-day Adventists— in Indonesia from 1904 to 1986 is discussed. The Christian work among the Muslim has grown notably since 1965.

Chapter 3 discusses methods and approaches in personal witnessing to the Muslims of Indonesia. The results of Survey of the Former Muslims in Indonesia are examined for contribution to understanding how lay Christians can share their faith to these people. Hospitality, the truth of the Adventist teaching, health messages, and the prohibitions of the unclean foods are found to be the most attractive features of the Adventist church to the Muslims.

Chapter 4 includes the conclusions and recommendations. The recommendations are based on the responses of the respondents to the survey discussed in chapter 3. Primarily, recommendations include: (1) that the Adventist Hospitality Seminar (AHS) be conducted in every church; (2) that the Lay Evangelists' Training Seminar (LETS) be more extensively conducted; and (3) that the decision of 1963 Islamic Conference in Beirut [i.e., that "every worker should study Muslim faith and also the language of Arabs"] be implemented.

Subject Area

Missions to Muslims--Indonesia; Christianity and other religions--Islam; Islam--Relations--Christianity

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

DOI

https://dx.doi.org/10.32597/dmin/236/

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