Date of Award

2023

Document Type

Dissertation Project

Degree Name

Doctor of Missiology

College

Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary

Program

Doctor of Missiology DMiss

First Advisor

Bruce L. Bauer

Second Advisor

Petr Činčala

Third Advisor

Jim Park

Abstract

Problem

In the past three decades, China has imposed serious restrictions on theological education in the Unorganized Territory (UT). The Adventist Church has endeavored to address this challenge by seeking various means of equipping its leaders through both formal and informal theological education. This study is needed because these attempts have never been reviewed in light of advancing the church’s mission especially in the area of discipleship.

Methods

Duce and Cameron (2013, 16-143) proposed the use of questionnaires, participant observation, interviews, focus groups, and documentary analysis in order to conduct theological research. Multiple research methods were utilized (Creswell 2014, 16; Creswell 2015, 80) in order to examine the impact of Chinese Adventist theological education on the church’s mission in China. The research methods in this study included documentary research, which utilized theory-based literature, a survey instrument for conducting the quantitative study, and in-depth interviews for surveying individual cases.

Results

The Pastoral Ministry Survey 2020-2021 and the interview of seven UT’s leaders who graduated from Chinese Adventist Theological Education (CATE) revealed that the CATE’s graduates have a greater ability to make disciples for Christ in the UT compared with those who never studied at CATE. However, the Global Church Membership Survey 2017-2018 revealed that UT’s church leaders lack knowledge of how to conduct mission to the cities, mission to various communities, and cross-cultural mission.

Conclusions

The effectiveness of theological education on growing disciples in the UT in the past three decades showed significant influence. The implementation of the mission of God in making disciples by CATE’s graduates is better than those who never studied at CATE. However, there is still room for theological education to improve to increase the effectiveness of making disciples for Christ.

Subject Area

Discipling (Christianity); Religious education; Unorganized territory (China)

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