Professional Dissertations DMin

Date of Award

2026

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Ministry

College

Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary

Program

Doctor of Ministry DMin

First Advisor

Kleber D. Gonçalves

Second Advisor

Walter Alaña

Third Advisor

Ricardo Norton

Abstract

Problem

Making disciples is the mission given by Jesus Christ to His followers; this must be the primary objective of the Christian life. Therefore, the church must carry out activities that follow the model of biblical discipleship in order to attract prospective disciples. Since its formation in 2012, the Hispanic Church of Rogers Heights has not experienced sustainable numerical growth because it did not implement a discipleship program or an intentional mentoring plan. The progressive loss of members, the lack of missionary commitment among its leaders, limited resources, and the low number of new disciples in proportion to the number of members constitute a problem that deserves to be addressed.

Method

This research employs a pre-experimental design with a single-group pre-test and post-test strategy, involving 10 participants of different nationalities, with a 1:1 proportion of men and women, selected through a non-probabilistic convenience sampling method. The research project work involved one year of implementation, during which the mentorship program was developed in 10 sessions. For the inferential analysis, a Student´s t-test was applied, and an interview was conducted at the end of the program.

Results

The results of this research show significant differences between the initial and final levels of discipleship. This difference is 14.30 points and is considered statistically significant (p < 0.05). Similar data are observed in the dimensions of the analyzed variable.

Conclusion

The result of this study demonstrates that a well-designed mentorship program, grounded in biblical parameters of discipleship, had a positive effect on the leaders from the Rogers Heights Hispanic Seventh-day Adventist Church, promoting growth in their way of being and making disciples.

Subject Area

Mentoring--Religious aspects--Seventh-day Adventists; Discipling (Christianity); Wyoming Rogers Heights Spanish Seventh-day Adventist Church (Wyoming, Mich.)

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