Professional Dissertations DMin

Date of Award

2025

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Ministry

College

Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary

Program

Doctor of Ministry DMin

First Advisor

Ricardo Bain

Second Advisor

Skip Bell

Third Advisor

Rogelio Paquini

Abstract

Problem.

The New Jersey Conference Young Adults Department presented three challenging areas to resolve before becoming a vibrant ministry: (1) a leadership succession pathway to train and develop state and area coordinators to plan regional and Conference-level events and initiatives; (2) training, nurturing, and discipling local church young adult leaders to discover their spiritual gifts while providing opportunities to serve; and (3) uniting the different young adult cultural groups to work together as a community of believers.

Method

A new urban approach was used to aid in changing the course of the Young Adults’ ministry for the New Jersey Conference. The Predictable Outcome Strategy (POS) was adapted and implemented; it was designed to build an infrastructure for urban-style young adult ministries. The model incorporated three stages. The first was a biblical foundation based on the gifts of the Spirit that guided the initiative’s mission, vision, and recruitment. The goal was to match the gifts of the recruited young adults with the roles they were being asked to serve. The second was to train the candidates in Seven Key Essentials to be used during the application stage. The Seven Key Essentials included approaches to help each candidate during the application stage. These included using the discipleship funnel for event planning, mastering the EPIC (experiential, participatory, image-driven, and connecting) approach for communications, and learning how to use the S.H.A.P.E. (spiritual gifts, heart, abilities, personality, and experience) method to help others discover their spiritual gifts. Finally, the application phase involved training local church young adults to utilize their spiritual gifts to serve their resident church and community, as well as other projects related to their gifts.

Results

A core team assisted in recruiting and developing a team of twelve coordinators. These coordinators used a discipleship funnel event planner to plan regional and Conference-wide activities for different discipleship and spiritual growth stages. The result was increased participation from all the various cultural groups, numerical growth in attendance, and a leadership succession plan via the infrastructure built using the Predictable Outcome Strategy (POS).

Conclusion

The by-product of using the POS produced several favorable outcomes: (1) a Conference team of eighty-four coordinators serving nine ministries have trained local young adult leaders to serve their church and community via various ministries, (2) the new team has become more effective and efficient by learning the art of time management for planning meetings and events, and (3) media has been used to attract young adults to our gatherings by utilizing an urban approach.

Subject Area

Discipling (Christianity); Church work with young adults--Religious aspects--Seventh-day Adventists; General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists. North American Division. Columbia Union Conference. New Jersey Conference; New Jersey Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

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