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Articles 1 - 30 of 1646
Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities
Living A Better Story: The Lived Narrative Apologetic In The Book Of Acts, Cedric Lemar Thomas
Living A Better Story: The Lived Narrative Apologetic In The Book Of Acts, Cedric Lemar Thomas
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
Is it possible to articulate an apologetic practice from the account of Luke-Acts, which is not among the current popular Christian apologetic practices within contemporary apologetic scholarship? Can one consider the narratives in this history of Acts as a description of apologetic methodology, a sort of a first Christian apologetic practice demonstrated by Jesus and then replicated by His disciples? The answer is yes. The historical work of Luke offers an early apologetic practice in which the story of Scripture, the narrative of God, witnessed incarnationally through the life of Jesus and continued by the early church. Like Scripture, the …
Exploring How Pentecostals Preach About Depression, Robert D. Mcbain
Exploring How Pentecostals Preach About Depression, Robert D. Mcbain
Salubritas: International Journal of Spirit-Empowered Counseling
A qualitative analysis was completed on twelve sermons into how Pentecostal preachers talk about depression from the pulpit using the Assemblies of God (AG) as a purposive sample. Findings illustrate that preachers talked about faulty thinking as the source of depression and interpreted depression as a transformative journey occurring within the context of a God encounter where the believer fixed their faulty thinking. While the way the preachers interpreted depression is not without critique, the article suggests that preaching about depression as a journey of encounter may help listeners frame their depression experiences within a narrative framework that helps them …
Church And Community: Bridging The Gap To Create A Culture Of Acceptance And Inclusiveness, Matthew L. Brown
Church And Community: Bridging The Gap To Create A Culture Of Acceptance And Inclusiveness, Matthew L. Brown
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
This DMIN project helped St. Paul High Street Baptist Church develop a community engagement team that helped them reestablish its long-lasting relationship with the community surrounding the church. Certain issues within and outside of the church were discussed that had led to a lack of community engagement within recent years. A community engagement team was put together to help bridge the gap between the church and its surrounding community. To help with this, several community engagement team events were held, and surveys were given to both church and community members. Through the successful completion of this project, St. Paul High …
Ripe For The Harvest: Developing Servants Through Spiritual Formation At Fairhaven Church Of Rootstown, Vincent A. Maltempi
Ripe For The Harvest: Developing Servants Through Spiritual Formation At Fairhaven Church Of Rootstown, Vincent A. Maltempi
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
This action research project addresses the need to develop committed Christian servants within a church ministry context by utilizing a spiritual formation initiative focused on service as a means towards and evidence of spiritual formation and development. Fairhaven Church of Rootstown had not been instructed on the fundamental need for members to serve together. Consequently, service within the church was not a necessary part of discipleship or its spiritual growth plan. The purpose of this intervention was to create and implement a three-fold spiritual development initiative focused on Christian service that includes a sermon series, a midweek study, and a …
Church-Supported Esl Ministry In Canada: A Look At The Church’S Mission In Action, Gordon Moulden
Church-Supported Esl Ministry In Canada: A Look At The Church’S Mission In Action, Gordon Moulden
Great Commission Research Journal
English is a dominant business, academic, and communicative language throughout the world. Immigrants and refugees coming to the West have a great need to learn the language but often do not have the funds or time to pursue studies full-time. Churches often offer English classes to minister to not only their language needs but also to their relational and spiritual needs. This mixed-methods survey and interview research investigates the state of church-supported English as a Second Language (ESL) programs across Canada following the COVID-19 pandemic. Approximately 50 teachers and program coordinators completed the survey, which revealed needs relating to training …
Sampling Methods And Sample Size In Church-Based Research, David R. Dunaetz
Sampling Methods And Sample Size In Church-Based Research, David R. Dunaetz
Great Commission Research Journal
An underlying assumption of most church-based research is that the sample from which the data is collected is representative of a wider collection of church members, church leaders, small groups, churches, denominations, or whatever is the focus of the study. To increase the likelihood that this assumption is met without making the research an impossible undertaking, various sampling strategies are used ranging from random sampling to convenience sampling, each with advantages and disadvantages. After a sampling strategy is chosen, an appropriate sample size should be pursued, depending on the nature of the study. The sample size of quantitative studies seeking …
I Want To Go To Church, Ella Burch
I Want To Go To Church, Ella Burch
English Student Projects
A creative writing piece used to describe the beginning of a journey back to faith for someone who has questioned the providing nature of God. A reminder of how being in a holy place with the simple intention of praying can mean as much as spreading the gospel on a distant shore.
Ephesians 2:11-22, Unity In Christ: A Biblical Theological Analysis, Kaeley Sells
Ephesians 2:11-22, Unity In Christ: A Biblical Theological Analysis, Kaeley Sells
Biblical Studies Student Projects
Often, in large group settings there can be a tendency to stick to one’s own in-group. This tendency then leads to the diminishing and exclusion of those outside of that particular group. In the early church, this was the story of the Gentile believers who, despite receiving the same life through the sacrifice of Christ were subject to discrimination, cultivating an inferiority complex in many of the early believers. Paul attempts to critique this trend by highlighting not only the grace extended to all but the intentional life, death, and resurrection of Christ that enables all believers to be citizens …
Impact Of Worldview Development On Spiritual Vitality In Evangelical Protestant Churches: A Phenomenological Study, Nicholas Jared Curtis
Impact Of Worldview Development On Spiritual Vitality In Evangelical Protestant Churches: A Phenomenological Study, Nicholas Jared Curtis
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
The need for a biblical worldview is important in the church since only ten percent of Americans (17% in the church) have a biblical worldview (Foley, 2017, paragraph one; Barna, 2017, paragraph twenty). This is directly connected with one’s spiritual growth in the church as relationships help form one’s worldview which in turn will form one’s values and actions (McDowell and Wallace, 2019). The purpose of this phenomenological study is to explore the perceived impact of biblical worldview development on spiritual development in the church for pastors who oversee discipleship at doctrinally conservative, Evangelical Protestant churches in Texas. At this …
A Phenomenological Study Of Church Polity And Its Impact On Pastoral Leadership And Congregational Health, Travis L. Biller
A Phenomenological Study Of Church Polity And Its Impact On Pastoral Leadership And Congregational Health, Travis L. Biller
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
It is reported that deacon-led churches produce conflict and high pastoral turnover (Harbuck, 2018; Payne, 1996). The purpose of this phenomenological study was to understand how a church governance structure impacts a pastor’s ability to lead, the health of the church, and pastoral retention. The experiences of pastors from deacon-led churches were evaluated for clusters of meaning and compared with the experiences of pastors who serve under an elder-led model of leadership. Nine interviews were conducted—five pastors from deacon-led churches and four from elder-led churches. This study approached the phenomenological design from an interpretive, or hermeneutical approach to understand the …
The Impact Of Artificial Intelligence In Online Education For Recruitment, Retention, And Sustainability Of Religious Organizations, Gordon Vaill Barrows
The Impact Of Artificial Intelligence In Online Education For Recruitment, Retention, And Sustainability Of Religious Organizations, Gordon Vaill Barrows
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
This dissertation explored the applicability of AI chatbot technology in the context of a church environment where it was used to promote an accessible and engaging online learning platform for education and ministry training. The primary objective was to develop an AI-powered chatbot to increase recruitment, improve retention, as well as support organizational sustainability as it relates to church membership. The research includes a comprehensive literature review on AI chatbot technology and its relevance to online education within the context of a religious organization. The literature review establishes the fundamentals for a theoretical framework, exploring the association between educational technology, …
Hell And Unhappiness In Larkins’S ‘High Windows’, Thomas Dilworth
Hell And Unhappiness In Larkins’S ‘High Windows’, Thomas Dilworth
English Publications
[This essay is a revision of an article entitled ‘Larkin’s “High Windows”, published in The Explicator 60:4 (Summer 2002), 221-3]
A Curriculum Designed To Teach Elementary-Age Children In Diverse Settings The Kingdom Concept Of Loving One’S Neighbor, Abigail J. Flood
A Curriculum Designed To Teach Elementary-Age Children In Diverse Settings The Kingdom Concept Of Loving One’S Neighbor, Abigail J. Flood
ELAIA
United States Census data from 2020 show that the country is becoming increasingly diverse and urbanized. Other research shows children are aware of race from an early age and can pick up biases and stereotypes by watching the adults around them. However, there are no children’s ministry curricula that specifically address how children should navigate differences from a biblical perspective. To fill this gap, a children’s ministry curriculum was written to model how children can love their neighbors like Jesus did, especially those who look different from themselves. The curriculum is comprised of an introduction for the ministry leader, five …
Quik Church, Route 3.141592, Sarah Voss
Quik Church, Route 3.141592, Sarah Voss
Journal of Humanistic Mathematics
The following set of poems are from one of ten sections in a collection of poetry called Quik Church: Short Poems that Travel Far. Each section illustrates one of many “streets” which individuals often take on their spiritual journey through life, e.g., the Old Gods Path, Nature Trail, Memory Skyway, Mystic Avenue, Pastoral Lane, and so on. This one, Route 3.141592, is the route of mathematics and the science that depends on mathematics.
Review Of Dr. Beth Felker Jones’ Practicing Christian Doctrine: An Introduction To Thinking And Living Theologically, Caleb Gordon
Review Of Dr. Beth Felker Jones’ Practicing Christian Doctrine: An Introduction To Thinking And Living Theologically, Caleb Gordon
Eleutheria: John W. Rawlings School of Divinity Academic Journal
This review of Practicing Christian Doctrine provides a helpful overview of Dr. Jones’ articulate survey through major Christian doctrines and related Christian practice. This resource serves as a succinct, formative primer to Christian theology with an aim at orthopraxy for the maturing Christian.
Review Of Know. Be. Live., Cory T. Branham
Review Of Know. Be. Live., Cory T. Branham
Eleutheria: John W. Rawlings School of Divinity Academic Journal
Born between 1995 – 2012, America’s young and emerging adults are known as “Generation Z.” As with nearly everything they are involved in, a shorter version of that label is available as simply Gen Z, or Gen Z’ers. Generally speaking, Gen Z’ers were raised by Millennials but have had life and social interactions going as far back as the Baby Boomer Generation (those born near the end of World War II and into the mid-sixties). In “Know. Be. Live.,” the combination of what has been handed down to them by previous generations, and the current state of cultural, …
Intergenerational Factors That Contribute To Millennial Church Engagement, Parker Sanderson
Intergenerational Factors That Contribute To Millennial Church Engagement, Parker Sanderson
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Millennial church attendance has declined since the beginning of the new millennium. Intergenerational ambivalence has been known to contribute to this phenomenon. Through this action research, the researcher sought to determine what intergenerational factors have led to millennials’ continued or discontinued attendance within churches. A phenomenological qualitative approach centered around interviews for this study was used to determine these intergenerational factors. The sample was taken from a 1,100-member church in a major Texas metropolitan area. The goal was to help church leaders decrease relational distancing and reduce ambivalent factors to increase millennial engagement in this local congregation.
Imperfect Church, Perfect God, Claire N. Barr
Imperfect Church, Perfect God, Claire N. Barr
Honors Projects
Jesus’ death on the cross demonstrates the most radical act of love. So when the church, which is biblically supposed to reflect Jesus’ love, causes pain and disagreements, there is no doubt as to why people choose to leave, completely stay away from the church, or lose their faith altogether. Despite this, the solution remains in Jesus. Through His ministry represented in scripture, one can see the way in which the church is called to care for the world. Despite this, the church has come short of Jesus’ example, often skewing people’s perspective on Christ. When on Earth, Jesus defied …
Grace-Based Faith Discipleship Approach Of Adults In South Rock Christian Church: Addressing The Contemporary Legalistic Lifestyle Of Disciples, Nicholas John Pannone
Grace-Based Faith Discipleship Approach Of Adults In South Rock Christian Church: Addressing The Contemporary Legalistic Lifestyle Of Disciples, Nicholas John Pannone
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
Discipleship often evokes different responses. However, contemporary Christians have a faithfulness dilemma driven by the constant messages they hear. This DMIN project seeks to develop and promote a ministry structure that educates, equips, and enriches the Christian life based on God’s grace. The project seeks to provide a framework for participants to be transformed holistically by God’s grace. Often, the members of South Rock Christian Church understand grace as the entry point into salvation, but not the identifying trait of their faithful life in Christ. This action project consists of qualitative research that demonstrates a gap between belief and action …
Parker, Heidi, Tegan Bryne
Parker, Heidi, Tegan Bryne
Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection
Heidi Parker is a 47-year-old lesbian, who uses she/her pronouns. Heidi Parker grew up in the South and Seventh-Day Adventist. One of her favorite parts about living in the South and still one of her favorite things today is the mountains. Heidi Parker has moved to a few places around the United States; including New York, Maine, Georgia, North and South Carolina, and Morrow Beach. Heidi Parker worked as a PE teacher before getting a higher degree in Sports Management. After getting her degree, she moved to New York and worked at Syracuse and then moved to Maine to work …
Worship In Modern-Day Society: Evaluating Music Of Corporate Worship, Lindley Christine Cameron
Worship In Modern-Day Society: Evaluating Music Of Corporate Worship, Lindley Christine Cameron
Masters Theses
Background Church services today incorporate a wide variety of worship music, stylistically and lyrically, depending on the congregation. Some churches place great importance on the gospel being included in the songs, while others focus more on the emotions felt during the songs. While there are churches that maintain an eclectic mix of the two, other churches have a significant imbalance in the worship songs they choose to sing each week. Matt Boswell says, “Every worship experience, in its order and content, is an expression of the congregation’s liturgy. It communicates something about your church, your doctrine, and the order of …
The Decalogue Of Justice: A Covenantal Application Of Biblical Justice, Andrew Mark Adil
The Decalogue Of Justice: A Covenantal Application Of Biblical Justice, Andrew Mark Adil
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
This dissertation aims to establish a biblical theology of justice (מִשְׁפָּט), ascertaining the commands and references to justice in Scripture are comprehensively and exclusively rooted in the Moral Law of the Torah, summarized in the Ten Commandments, and embedded in the Covenant of Grace (Old and New), making it binding on New Covenant believers and inextricably attached to the church’s Great Commission mandate. To this end, the study examines the concept of justice in the OT and the Moral Law, contrasting Reformed evangelical hermeneutics with the modern iteration of Liberation Theology in connection with the application of biblical justice. Additionally, …
A Phenomenological Study Of The High-Tech, High-Touch Pastor: Maximizing Personal Ministry In A Digital Age, Shirley Groce
A Phenomenological Study Of The High-Tech, High-Touch Pastor: Maximizing Personal Ministry In A Digital Age, Shirley Groce
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
This qualitative phenomenological study aimed to explore how high-tech, high-touch senior pastors who practice servant leadership establish and maintain personal contact with their church members and lead them using digital technology. This research was particularly relevant in an era of social distancing required by the COVID-19 pandemic. The theoretical framework for this study was Greenleaf's servant leadership theory. Ten experienced pastors were interviewed to determine how they balanced the impersonal nature of streaming worship services while maintaining personal contact with their congregations. These interviews were transcribed, and important themes were identified to determine best practices for using technology while maintaining …
Letter From The Chairman: Over One Hundred Years Of Student Publications At Concordia Seminary, Ben Vanderhyde
Letter From The Chairman: Over One Hundred Years Of Student Publications At Concordia Seminary, Ben Vanderhyde
Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal
For hundreds of years, in various countries, through various languages, Christian pastors have exhorted their people to lift up their hearts in the liturgy of Holy Communion. Whether or not every church has always used these precise words, the exhortation is universal among Christians. We are called to put our faith and trust in the one who is above us; to set our hope firmly on the one whose second advent is on the verge of dawning; to aim all of our desires and affections toward the one who made us. In short, we lift up our hearts to the …
Pierre Manent: The Empire Of Modernity And The Church’S Response, Hayden Lukas
Pierre Manent: The Empire Of Modernity And The Church’S Response, Hayden Lukas
Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal
Manent’s body of work often problematizes the modern conservative impulse to draw on the history of thought with modernity’s conception of history, and this essay will attempt to explain this dynamic. To do this, I will explain the basics of Manent’s account of modernity as a way of evaluating history, drawing on the work of other political philosophers to supplement Manent’s account. Then I will examine how the work of Manent and Emile Perreau-Saussine, with the Catholic response to the Enlightenment, can contribute to the Church’s strategy to engage with the puzzle of modernity. .
Learning The Liturgy With Mr. Miyagi: The Case For Liturgical Catechesis, Benjamin Leeper
Learning The Liturgy With Mr. Miyagi: The Case For Liturgical Catechesis, Benjamin Leeper
Grapho : Concordia Seminary Student Journal
Using the narrative of The Karate Kid as a guide, I will demonstrate that Christian formation is a matter of recontextualizing liturgical practices in the daily life of the believer, so that she knows when, where, and how to use the precogni¬tive spiritual habits formed by Word and Sacrament in Christian worship. This understanding challenges prevalent liturgical theology, which tends to assume an automatic connection—or worse, no connection at all— between worship and daily life, by highlighting the necessity of locating for believers the telos of the church’s rites and ceremonies in discipleship. Finally, I will provide concrete examples of …
The Voice Of One Crying In The Wilderness, Megan Kenyon
The Voice Of One Crying In The Wilderness, Megan Kenyon
MFA in Visual Art
I am a Midwestern, Christian, and feminist artist. I make work about the beautiful, broken, and absurd ways in which American evangelical culture influences lives, especially women’s lives. I’m dragging everything into the light by deconstructing and critiquing the world in which I live, move, and have my being. I do this by harnessing prophetic imagination and incarnational space to shine a light on how patriarchy infects evangelical Christian theology and practice. Using prophetic imagination through photographic self-portraiture and text (my own and found texts using the Bible), I seek to make plain the effects of white, Christian patriarchy on …
Seat At The Table: An Inclusive Ministry To Families And Individuals With Disabilities At Plainfield Christian Church, Lindy Ruth Rader
Seat At The Table: An Inclusive Ministry To Families And Individuals With Disabilities At Plainfield Christian Church, Lindy Ruth Rader
Christian Ministries Senior Capstone
Churches are called to be a place of welcoming and belonging, but it is common for individuals and families with disabilities to not feel like they have a place in the Church. Seat At The Table is a ministry designed to address this problem and help families feel integrated into the local church. This ministry is a part of Plainfield Christian Church, located in Plainfield, Indiana. Seat At The Table desires to create a space for individuals and families to encounter Jesus and to form a deep and lasting relationship with Him. Along with this, they want participants in the …
Equipping Covenant Baptist Church To Defend The Bible In A Skeptical World, Harlan Grant Mclain
Equipping Covenant Baptist Church To Defend The Bible In A Skeptical World, Harlan Grant Mclain
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
The thesis of this research project is “If Covenant Baptist Church members are taught the reliability of the Bible, they will be equipped to defend their faith to a skeptical world.” The goals of this doctoral thesis are two-fold: to train adequate believers regarding the Bible’s reliability in a skeptical world, and honor God in the process through the equipping ministry of the church in accordance with Ephesians 4:11-16. Seven lessons were researched, formulated, and presented to a small group of believers in Covenant Baptist Church who desired to become more confident in defending the Bible to a skeptic. Entrance …
Analyzing The Relationship Between Pastoral Leadership And Church Attendance In Baptist Congregations In Eastman, Georgia, Michael Carruthers
Analyzing The Relationship Between Pastoral Leadership And Church Attendance In Baptist Congregations In Eastman, Georgia, Michael Carruthers
Doctoral Dissertations and Projects
The reality of the decline of the church is evident in many churches today. What is causing the decline in worship attendance? This research study examined 14 of the 42 Baptist churches in Eastman, Georgia, from the Dodge County Baptist Association, where the average weekly reporting worship attendance during 2018 to 2021 was 50 to 150 in attendance. This research used the survey method, where participants anonymously answered questions regarding their church and pastor. The research study's results objectively prove that pastoral leadership can affect church attendance. Further research can be completed to investigate this connection between pastoral leadership and …