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Item A missiological exploration of the encounters between Reuben Omulo and the Church Missionary Society in Central Nyanza, Kenya(South African Theological Seminary, 2022) Omondi, Francis 1966; Kritzinger, J. N. J.; Johannes S. MalherbeThis research examined the Anglican Church’s history of mission in Central Nyanza, focusing on the formative role played by Reuben Omulo, a Luo mission innovator. It explored the key features of the mission praxis of Omulo and his encounters with the Church Missionary Society (CMS). It adopted Kritzinger’s (2008) seven-point “praxis matrix” in an “encounterological” approach to probe the encounters between the mission praxes of Omulo and CMS. This involved investigating the dynamics of the interaction between those praxes, focusing on each of the seven dimensions in turn. The study used data from personal interviews and discussions with a selected group of respondents from Siaya and Kisumu Counties, among families and places where Omulo worked. It analysed secondary data from relevant published works and other written materials from private archives. The pre-colonial encounters forged the diverse Luo people into a nation, as this research clarified, and further described those complex relations, which shaped critical features of the Southern Luo world, priming them for their encounters with the European colonialists and CMS missionaries. CMS’s intention for indigenizing the Church met resonance in Omulo. As the research illustrated, Christianity met spiritual needs that traditional religion could not. For Omulo and his colleagues, more so, the vernacular Scriptures eliminated ambiguities in the Luo religion, making the transition to Christianity more effortless for them. The study revealed a creative tension between Omulo and CMS praxes, which for Omulo was an attempt to balance Christianity’s demands with traditional responsibilities and integrate the Luo into Christianity. But CMS sought to interpret the Luo worldview to infuse it with the Scriptural message of Christianity. Omulo and his colleagues proved to be active recipients of the Gospel, as the study showed, for protesting colonial injustice, compelled the authority to reform, and further stimulated CMS and Anglican Church in Kenya to embrace a social justice spirituality. The challenges facing the Anglican Church of Kenya (ACK) can be traced to how CMS established the African Anglican Church in Central Nyanza, as this research showed. This research, therefore, suggested that the ACK should focus on empowering the laity as her primary agency for mission and that the Church’s mission praxis must reaffirm culture to speak to the core needs of the people. It recommended that mission history be studied with the praxis matrix as part of an “encounterological” approach.Item Die Dringlichkeit der strategischen Konsolidierung junger Christen/Gemeinden bei Paulus exemplarisch im 1. Thessalonicherbrief (2,17-3,10), mit möglichen Implikationen für die Gemeindegründungs-, bzw. Gemeinderevitalisierungsbewegung: Eine exegetisch systematische Untersuchung.(South African Theological Seminary Johannesburg, 2022) Luz, Edgar 1972; Vogt, Titus; Vogt, TitusIn dieser Arbeit wird die Frage untersucht, welche Priorität der Apostel Paulus der Nacharbeit mit seinen jungen Konvertiten einräumt. Es wird erforscht, welche Dringlichkeit und Strategie hinter den uns offenbarten apostolischen Maßnahmen und Aktivitäten in seinen neuen Gemeinden stehen. Als Modell wählen wir die Gemeinde in Thessaloniki. Darin wird zuerst allgemein die Frage nach der Existenz einer Strategie bei Pls. aus verschiedenen Perspektiven erörtert. Anschließend werden die gängigen Ansätze in der aktuelleren biblisch-theologischen Fachliteratur auf die letztlichen Ambitionen des Apostels für die jungen Konvertiten in Thessaloniki analysiert und die Resultate in einer kurzen Synthese vergleichend aufgearbeitet. Hierbei sehen wir, dass die Ansätze weniger Alternativen als Komplementierung zueinander darstellen. Eine längere Einführung in den 1 Thess.-brief versucht, neben den allgemeinen Einleitungfragen, vor allem die Länge des Erstaufenthaltes und die genaue Abfolge der Nacharbeitsinitiativen festzulegen. Dieser folgt eine intensive Auseinandersetzung mit dem curricularen Inhalt der katechetischen Erstunterweisung, die Pls. der Gemeinde bei seinem ersten Aufenthalt in Thessaloniki gab. Dieser wird nachfolgend richtungsweisend in einen kurzen ersten Fazit zusammengefasst, wobei hier ein Schwerpunkt auf die „parakaleo“ Wortfamilie im 1 Thess.-brief gelegt und unter den drei Aspekten des integrierten Dienstes, inhaltlichen Dichte und intensivierten Dynamik kategorisiert wird. Hierauf folgt eine kurze textkritische Untersuchung unseres Modelltextes aus 1 Thess 2,17-3,10 mit dem Ziel, sich zu familiarisieren mit dem weiteren Kontext, inneren Aufbau, Sprache und Stil. Einer detaillierten dreiteiligen Einzelexegese folgt ein längeres Fazit mit der Analyse der in der Forschungsfrage wichtigen Aspekte auf dem Hintergrund der Details des Textes und seiner Auslegung. Diese wird tabellarisch aufgearbeitet und mit einem kurzen Schlussplädoyer abgerundet. Abschließend wird versucht, die erarbeiteten Prinzipien in einigen kurzen Thesen für die Missions- und Gemeindearbeit des 21. Jahrhunderts fruchtbar zu machen.Item A Socio-Rhetorical Analysis of Paul’s Speech in Acts 17:16–34: Implications for a Missions Strategy Beyond the Ewes in the Global Evangelical Church in Ghana.(South African Theological Seminary Johannesburg, 2022) Sackitey, Francis Lawer 1967; Van Deventer, Cornelia; Van Deventer, CorneliaThe command Jesus gave the Church to make disciples of all nations in Matthew 28:16–20 calls for a missions strategy that takes into consideration the socio-cultural, religious, and linguistic backgrounds of those the Church reaches out to. The writer of the Acts of the Apostles narrates how in carrying out the mandate of the Great Commission, the Holy Spirit through the apostles, adopted various mission strategies to fulfil that mandate. The Apostle Paul’s speech in Acts 17:16–34 is one of the classic examples of how the early missionaries adopted the socio-cultural, religious, and linguistic background of their audiences to carry the gospel message across. This thesis adopts a socio-rhetorical analysis methodology to analyse Paul’s speech in Acts 17:16–34 with the aim of distilling implications of the speech for missions strategy which will take care of the socio-cultural, religious, and linguistic settings of the people the Church evangelises. Many scholars, having researched the Areopagus speech, have proposed that the gospel message must be contextualised into the cultural context of those evangelised. One major gap in those studies however is how the Church must articulate the gospel in a multicultural and linguistic context to distil theological and missiological truth(s) for the African (and, in this case, Ghanaian) context, where language planning and the accommodation of tribal distinctions are frequently undermined in the Church’s missions strategy. The research considered the context of the book of Acts, examined the socio-rhetorical context of Paul’s speech in Acts 17:16–34, undertook a socio-rhetorical analysis of the speech, and explored its significance for missions strategy. The practical significance of the socio-rhetorical interpretation of Paul’s speech in Acts 17:16–34 is the acquisition of handles for the Global Evangelical Church in Ghana and abroad to expand its missions plan beyond service to the Ewe people. The research revealed that though the early Church struggled to integrate Jews and Gentiles as worldviews, language practices, history, and other factors were anything but monolithic, the apostle Paul adopted a missions strategy that demonstrates a worthwhile attempt to bridge tribal and language barriers in his mission work.