An analysis of the biblical culture that valued hospitality as a supreme virtue. It explores how hospitality shapes Christian’s identity as the recipient of God’s hospitality at the Lord’s Table, and would help develop a theology of hospitality and Christian presence to others in homes and in the household of faith, as a means of participating in the mission of God in an unhospitable world.

Students will understand and evaluate various models for how the Church negotiates its position vis-à-vis those deemed outside the community. This course will utilize the methods of the social sciences, including, social-identity theory and social psychology, for the purposes of better understanding how the early Church addressed its own distinctives in diverse cultures and contexts. This will be done for the purpose of translating the earliest practices into the contemporary Church in its worldwide diversity. Student evaluation will include reading, lectures, discussion forums, an essay, an exam, and a service project.

In this course, students practice making the Gospel translatable to the cultural context of their field of mission, they are equipped to employ a redemptive-historical hermeneutic for interpreting scripture and research six descriptive domains that encapsulate the cultural orientations of their mission field. As students acquire knowledge of missional practices, consult an expert practitioner and get involved in an on-site evaluation of a place where Gospel and missio Dei intersect, they accumulate vital resources for coherently contextualizing the Gospel in any mission field.

If the world keeps changing, so must the church. This course is designed to equip those who have a creative heart and mind for the missional church with new contextual forms of ministry. Students will be informed and challenged to imagine and design a new fresh expression strategy to engage their particular community.

This course will examine a Gospel centered community. They will develop an understanding of their Gospel Identity and their biblical mandate to be a unified community centered on the Gospel living the Spirit’s mission to build the Kingdom. The class will research the nature, function, and form of the church that is centered on the Gospel. From this research students will learn the theology behind a Gospel Centered Missional Community and develop their own practical steps to implementing one into their local context.

Missional living is not an event we add to our busy lives, it is our everyday response to the Great Commission ‘as you go make disciples’. This course is therefore designed to equip students to explore the practical and everyday practices of missional living in a world of competing worldviews. Through cultural analysis, students will name and define missional practices for their context.