You are welcome to peruse these theses/dissertations. They may be cited, but please observe standard academic protocol for doing so. If you wish to contact the author(s), email your request to admin@agstalliance.com.
Quicklinks:
– Thomos S Sihombing (2022): The Impact of a Values Education Program Regarding Offspring, Wealth and Glory on the Batak Toba Christian Parents at Huria Kristen Batak Protestan (HKBP) Church
– Rudy Tejalaksana (2022): Spiritual fathering as an approach to disciple the Lani youth of Papua, Indonesia
– Gary Goh Kok Hiong (2022): Christian Futures Studies
– Kenneth John Iskov (2021): Education as a Factor in Successful Church Planting
– Christopher J. A. Cooper (2021): Intra-cohort relationships in cross-cultural training
– Justin Peter (2020): Personality-informed strategy for debriefing Christian experiential learning activities
– Frank McLean Hawthorne (2017): Christian conversion and spiritual maturity in Southeast Asia
– Lau Ying Kheng (2016): Encouraging Singaporean seminary students to use reflexivity
– Winnie Chan Sin Ming (2015): Parental participation in faith nurture of primary school aged children in Sarawak
– Perry W. H. Shaw (2012): Congregational leadership for growing Arab churches
Thomos S Sihombing (2022), EdD (Child & Family Development)
Supervisors: Dr. Robert O. Rajagukguk, Dr. Rosalind Tan
The Impact of a Values Education Program Regarding Offspring, Wealth and Glory on the Batak Toba Christian Parents at Huria Kristen Batak Protestan (HKBP) Church.
If you would like to read a copy of the dissertation, please contact Thomos directly: thomossihombing@gmail.com.
Traditionally, Batak Toba people are steep in their cultural values, especially the value of offspring, wealth and glory. They believe they will attain their life goal if they have lots of children, fortune, and prestige. This attitude has influenced the behavior of the Batak Toba people and affected the expressions of their faith as Christians. The survey data gathered from HKBP Church showed that the Batak Toba Christian parents do not clearly understand the biblical teachings on the value of offspring, wealth and glory. A biblical values education program was developed to address the need above. Analysis of the pre and post-tests shows that the biblical values education program has statistically improved the biblical knowledge and attitude of the Batak Toba Christian parents regarding the value offspring, wealth and glory, meaning, they can now respond biblically to their cultural values
Rudy Tejalaksana (2022), EdD (Child & Family Development)
Supervisors: Dr. Samuel Sidjabat, Dr. Edward W. Sands.
Spiritual fathering as an approach to disciple the Lani youth of Papua, Indonesia [PDF]
This ethnographic study explores how spiritual fathering can be used as an approach to disciple the Lani youth of Papua, who are raised in fatherless homes. The literature review highlights the significance of spiritual fathering and emotional processes and explains male spiritual leadership in Melanesian culture and the Lani family system. The field research was conducted using Spradley’s ethnosemantics Developmental Research Sequence. Twelve Lani youth, ages 19–24, participated in the ethnographic interviews and in-person validation discussions. The findings reveal that Lani fathers have spiritual power to control and influence their children, which affects how Lani youth perceive their identity, trust of others, and view of God. The presence of a “brotherly father-figure” who provides authentic emotional support and trusted-reliable relationships through “feasting together” and “self-sacrifice” are effective practices of spiritual fathering that communicate significant meanings of closeness, acceptance, trustworthiness, and attentiveness.
Gary Goh Kok Hiong (2022), EdD (Spiritual Formation and Discipleship)
Supervisor: Dr. Jennifer Turner
Christian Futures Studies: Designing a Course Syllabus to Develop Foresight Competency among Mandarin-speaking Christian Leaders in East Asia [PDF]
The pace of change is accelerating. To cope effectively, leaders must exercise foresight to prepare for change before it happens. Yet, it is unclear what constitutes foresight competency and how to develop it. This research identified three core competencies that constitute individual or organisational foresight capability, namely scanning, simulating and strategising. A course syllabus was designed, and pilot tested at Malaysia Baptist Theological Seminary. Findings show that (1) The course increased learners’ sensitivity to change, and improved their understanding of the future. (2) Learners were able to acquire the three core competencies of foresight within the short course. (3) Learners were generally more confident to face the uncertain future after training. This research highlights the motif of watchful preparation, promotes the habit of risk management and continuous learning, and provides a roadmap for subsequent curriculum development in Christian futures studies.
Kenneth John Iskov (2021), EdD (Spiritual Formation & Discipleship)
Supervisor: Dr. Patricia Harrison
Education as a Factor in Successful Church Planting: A study of the development of Foursquare Gospel churches in the southern region of Papua New Guinea (2004 to 2013) [PDF]
In Southern PNG 2005-2013 dozens of new Foursquare churches were planted. A Bible college established at the start of that period was significant in that movement. This study identifies the educational factors contributing to the establishment of these churches, with a view to enhancing the educational effectiveness of Foursquare Bible colleges.
Subjects were researched using a participant-observer qualitative methodology. The results suggest the importance of resourcing students financially, deployment in meaningful outreach settings, contextually appropriate curriculum materials, accountability through regular reporting, and the strategic value of experienced practitioner/mentors in an apprenticeship-like arrangement. The key finding is proposed as Transformational Sentness, describing the motivational, spiritual and educational transformations that occurred in students as they participated in church planting outreach.
Christopher J. A. Cooper (2021)
Supervisor: Dr. Allan Harkness
Intra-cohort relationships in cross-cultural training: A mixed methods study of the importance of intra-cohort relationships to three dimensions of growth and learning [PDF]
This mixed methods study explores how intra-cohort relationships formed in an agency-based residential pre-field training course for cross-cultural workers are important to the development of participants in the dimensions of instrumental, communicative, and reflective learning. The study used a three-phase exploratory sequential design. The first phase focus group interviews distilled concepts to explore. In the second phase 125 former trainees completed an online survey. In the third phase quantitative data analysis established a feasible model of these three dimensions of growth and learning and used this to estimate the relative contributions of fellow trainees amongst a group of six influences. The findings suggest that typically, fellow trainees contribute little to Instrumental Learning (of the order of 5%) but make significant contributions to Communicative and Reflective Learning (of the order of 15-25% each.
Justin Peter (2020)
Supervisor: Dr. Allan Harkness
InSNFT Debrief: A personality-informed strategy for debriefing Christian experiential learning activities in a young adult ministry based on Jungian psychological type theory
If you would like to read a copy of the dissertation, please contact Peter directly: approach.justin@gmail.com.
Debrief is a crucial component of experiential learning, and a well-executed debrief enables learners to make sense of the experience, conceptualise learning and transfer the learning to real life situations. This study examined how a debrief strategy informed by Carl Jung’s psychological type theory – that peoples’ innate personalities influence the way they process and evaluate information – contributes to the effectiveness of debriefing Christian experiential learning activities in a young adult ministry in Singapore. Comprising of frontloads, reflection questions and probings designed to engage the Sensing (S), Intuition (N), Feeling (F) and Thinking (T) mental processes in learners, the SNFT Debrief was developed and implemented across two action research cycles with seven young adult learners during experiential learning sessions. Qualitative data from the debrief was collected using researcher observation, audio recording of the debrief, online participant survey, online personality inventory, interview with an informed observer and focus group.
The findings indicate that the SNFT Debrief has potential to enhance deeper learning and Christian faith formation for young adults in four key ways: 1) Type-informed debrief questions engage the various psychological types; 2) Type-distinct frontloads enable participants to process the debrief questions using their preferred and non-preferred psychological functions; 3) Type-based probings for S-questions and N-questions help participants to re-focus on using appropriate psychological functions; and 4) Type-diverse grouping contributes towards mutual learning.
Frank McLean Hawthorne (2017)
Supervisors: Dr. Martin Dowson and Dr. Allan Harkness
An Attachment Theory perspective on Christian conversion and spiritual maturity in four people groups in South and Southeast Asia
If you would like to read a copy of the dissertation, please contact McLean directly: fmclean@mac.com.
This dissertation represents a study of psychological processes implicated in Christian conversion and spiritual maturity. Centrally, this study asserts that conversion and spiritual maturity can be understood psychologically in terms of attachment processes. This understanding can supplement theological and missiological understandings of conversion and spiritual maturity. Much of the focus in Christian missions has been on levels of conversion in specific contexts. Strategizing and implementing strategic efforts to increase the numbers of converts has been a major missions focus. In contrast, the focus of the present study is on Attachment Theory and the role secure attachment relationships have in the process of conversion and on the quality of a convert’s relationship with God after conversion. This focus is taken because it is hypothesized that the quality of a convert’s relationship with God has significant impact on the convert’s spiritual maturity. In turn, spiritual maturity is thought to bring about desired outcomes that are of concern in the missiological literature—including greater participation on the part of converts in evangelistic efforts among their own people groups and other, unreached and less reached people groups.
Psychological theory and psychometric methods are used in this study because they provide the framework and tools needed to investigate the quality, antecedents, and consequences of a convert’s relationship with God after conversion. The study sample was comprised of 788 respondents from four distinct people groups in South and Southeast Asia. The groups represented three major non-Christian religious backgrounds. Data, gathered using a survey questionnaire, were analyzed using structural equation modeling techniques, including confirmatory factor analyses and path analyses. Results supported hypotheses indicating that secure attachment relationships have a meaningful role in the processes of conversion and spiritual maturity of converts. Findings of the study could serve to inform Christian pastors, evangelists, church planters, missionaries, and educators in the regions of South and Southeast Asia and beyond.
Lau Ying Kheng (2016)
Supervisor: Dr. Jennifer Turner
Encouraging Singaporean seminary students to use reflexivity in their ministry practice [PDF]
This dissertation addresses the urgent need to educate Singapore seminary students in radical and innovative reflexivity so that they will continue to be effective in ministry in a rapidly changing world. The action research among twenty-six students at the East Asia School of Theology have shown that reflexivity can, and must be taught. However reflexivity is recommended not as a methodology but rather as a posture. Just as servant-leadership is not simply concerned with techniques but the heart, so training in reflexivity is the education of the practitioner’s posture, attitude, and mindset: of maintaining balance as both teacher and learner; and of readiness to effect change through the three requisites which prepare for reflexivity – challenging assumptions, engaging with emotions, and employing reflexive dialogues. For maximum effectiveness it has been found that these must operate within an attitude of restfulness in the rhythm of deep learning and, very importantly for the Christian minister, with dependence on the direction of the Holy Spirit in making choices. When seminary students are taught reflexivity, they learn to search honestly within themselves, especially in the moment of service, to expose embedded motives and pre-judgements, be alert to emotions that can stumble or expedite critical learning, and use reflexive questions to invent new paradigms for lifelong learning and ministry. Finally, this dissertation shows that even more fundamental than the underlying theories, biblical discussions, and suggested curriculum, the reflexivity classroom must be dynamic, developing, and dialogic. Without live awareness of incontext modelling of reflexivity, there will not be the spontaneous discovery and application of learning by both the teacher and the student which serves to create the atmosphere for the curriculum implicit in this training.
Winnie Chan Sin Ming (2015)
Supervisor: Dr. Rosalind Lim-Tan
Appropriate parental participation in faith nurture of primary school aged children in urban Chinese families of the Sarawak Chinese Annual Conference of the Methodist Church in Malaysia [PDF]
This study investigated how the parents of primary school aged children of the Sarawak Chinese Annual Conference (SCAC) of the Methodist Church in Malaysia can be better equipped and be more effective as partners in faith nurture of their children. The study used the qualitative research method of grounded theory. Data were collected through interviews with sixteen parents and seventeen children from four different Methodist Chinese churches in Sarawak.
The emerging theory has five propositions: 1) The major responsibility of faith nurture of children lies with the parents. 2) The church and the family need to be in partnership in nurturing the faith of the children. 3) Parents need help to build up their own life and emotions if they want to nurture the faith of their children adequately. 4) Parents need to encourage a two-way direction when communicating faith matters with their children. 5) Children’s faith is nurtured when they spend time doing ordinary everyday things with their parents.
Finally, this study proposed three possible ways to support parental participation in faith nurture of their children in the SCAC churches: 1) Churches be more intentional in offering creative and accessible ways for the faith community so as to partner with parents in forming nurturing environments that promote the faith development of children. 2) Parents may find it helpful to join a parent support group for building their own life and emotions. 3) Families may need to spend time with each other, talking about faith matters and also enjoy doing ordinary everyday things.
Perry W. H. Shaw (2012)
Supervisors: Dr. Paul Sanders and Dr. Rowland Edwards
Congregational leadership for growing Arab churches: A critical-contextual and systemic study of Middle Eastern Arab Protestant churches [PDF]
This thesis has examined the extent to which healthy church life in the Arab world is reflective of critically contextual systemic patterns of congregational leadership. Comparative quantitative data using Parsons and Leas’ (1993) Congregational Systems Inventory found that two clusters of behaviour were typical of numerically growing Arab churches. Either within the study itself or in research elsewhere elements of the first cluster of planned strategy, mandatory process, and collegial relatedness were found to be somewhat characteristic of the broader Arab society. However, the second cluster of dispersed authority, visionary pastoral and lay leadership, and metamising learning patterns was found to be atypical of Arab society. A dialogue with biblical-theological reflections on leadership suggests that both typical and atypical characteristics of healthy Arab churches find affirmation in Scripture, pointing to the significance of critical-contextual patterns of leadership.