Awareness, Perceptions and Challenges of Contextualization among Adventist Graduate Seminary Students in Africa

Abstract

Christian mission mandate is evidently linked to God’s fundamental initiative and commitment to reconcile sinful humanity to himself. Thus, the church today only continues in the mission of reconciling lost humanity to God. In doing mission, however, a continuing challenge has been on how best to communicate and facilitate the acceptance of the gospel while remaining biblically faithful. This has led to the somewhat contentious practice of contextualization. Within the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Africa, the quest for contextualization seems to have sustained discussions on its concept/description, whether and how to contextualize the gospel and the challenges to such practice. Therefore, this study investigated the awareness, perceptions and challenges of contextualization among Graduate Seminary Students who are Seventh-day Adventist pastors in Africa. The study adopted a descriptive survey design. A purposive sampling method was used to select two hundred (200) Graduate Seminary students from the four masters and two doctoral programmes offered by the Adventist University of Africa, Nairobi. Ninety-two (92) of respondents participated in the survey. The data gathered from the survey were presented and discussed using frequency distribution tables. The study discovered that the pastors of the Seventh-day Adventist church in Africa claimed to be sufficiently aware of contextualization. However, some perceived it to be the same as inculturation and indigenization. The study further revealed that while the respondents agreed that contextualization could enhance mission and faith practices, there seemed to be some challenges on the spheres that contextualization could occur. Finally, the study identified some challenges to contextualization. Therefore, relevant recommendations were made based on the findings of the study