IMAGINATION & @FullerSeminary ‘s #TreyClark on imagination, symbols, dreams & how the Dominicans used them to share the Good News.

Commentary by Dr. Whitesel (6/15/18):  I enjoyed Fuller Seminary PhD theology student Trey Clark’s presentation on how art, aesthetics, imagination and story were combined as early Dominicans shared the Good News in the new world.  It was given to the AETE (Academy for Evangelism in Theological Education), an academic community which I serve as president emeritus.

Below are some takeaways:

• The Dominicans sensed they lived in the end times, which motivated and energized their efforts. As Trey researched further, I asked him to look into if there is a correlation between a theological eschatology and a motivation/energy invested into evangelism.
• Interesting fact: the Dominicans sometimes took a year to communally create the sermons to create relevance and apologetic impact.

MENTORING & We grow from imitation, not just from information and exhortation.

“We grow from imitation, not just from information and exhortation.”

– Rick Richardson, Wheaton College professor to the Academy for Evangelism in Theological Education, Univ. of Northwestern, St. Paul, MN, 6/17/16.

EVANGELISM & Why Ron Sider Thinks We Need “Evangelicals for Evangelism”

Ron Sider:

“When I started ‘Evangelicals for Social Action’ it was to shake up evangelicals and get them involved in social action. If I were going to start an organization today it would be called ‘Evangelicals for Evangelism’ because that’s what’s missing in our churches today!”

Personal conversation with Ron Sider by Rick Richardson PhD from a presentation to the Academy for Evangelism in Theological Education, Univ. Of Northwestern, St. Paul, MN, 6/17/16.

AETE & @FullerSeminary’s Amos Yong addresses annual meeting on Apostolic Evangelism in the Postcolony: Opportunities & Challenges

Academy for Evangelism in Theological Education, annual meeting, June 2016, University of Northwestern, St. Paul, MN.  Photo by Bob Whitesel, 2015-17 president of the AETE.

 

AETE & Fuller Seminary’s Amos Yong to keynote the Annual Conference of the Academy for Evangelism in Theological Education (AETE) at the University of Northwestern, June 16-17.

The Academy for Evangelism in Theological Education (AETE) holds a yearly meeting that serves to explore cutting edge issues and trends in evangelism and the teaching of evangelism today.

The 2016 annual meeting will be held at the University of Northwestern in Minnesota from June 16-17, at the same time as the annual meeting of the Association of Professors of Mission, and immediately before the annual meeting of the American Society of Missiology, which AETE members are invited to attend.

Thursday, June 16

10 a.m – 10 p.m. Registration

4:15 – 5:00 p.m. AETE Executive Team Meeting

5:30 – 6:30 p.m. Dinner

6:45 – 7:15 p.m. Welcome and Introduction to 2016 AETE Annual Meeting

7:15 – 8:30 p.m. AETE Plenary: “Evangelism in the Postcolony: Opportunities and Challenges” — Dr. Amos Yong

Dr. Amos Yong is Professor of Theology and Mission and director of the Center for Missiological Research at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California. His graduate education includes degrees in theology, history, and religious studies from Western Evangelical Seminary (now George Fox Seminary) and Portland State University, Portland, Oregon, and Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts, and an undergraduate degree from Bethany University of the Assemblies of God. He has authored or edited over three dozen volumes. He and his wife, Alma, have three children – Annalisa, a junior at Point Loma University (San Diego, California); Alyssa, a graduate of Vanguard University (Costa Mesa, California); and Aizaiah (pronounced like the biblical Isaiah, also married to Neddy), who overseas the local missions initiatives at Azusa Pacific University – and one granddaughter (Serenity Joy, from Aizaiah and Neddy). Amos and Alma reside in Pasadena, California.

8:45 – 9:00 p.m. AETE Evening Prayer

Friday, June 17

10 a.m. – 10 p.m. Registration

8:45 – 9:00 a.m. AETE Morning Prayer

9:00 – 11:45 a.m. AETE Track Presentations and Conversations:

1. Expanding the Frontiers of Evangelism Research
   — Dr. David Gustafson, Facilitator
2. Best Practices for Evangelism in Theological Education
   — Dr. Mark Teasdale, Facilitator
3. Theological Issues in Evangelism
   — Dr. George Hunsberger, Facilitator

Noon – 1:00 p.m. Lunch

1:15 – 2:30 p.m. AETE Plenary: “Former President’s Address: Equipping Seminarians to Lead Churches that Reach the Unchurched” — Dr. Rick Richardson

Dr. Rick Richardson is Professor of Evangelism and Leadership at Wheaton College and the Director of the Master’s in Evangelism and Leadership and the Master’s in Missional Church Movements degrees. He has recently been appointed an Affiliate Professor of Evangelism and Mission in Western Contexts at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, and is co-directing the new emphasis in the Intercultural Studies PhD program on Mission in Western Contexts. He is also a Graduate Faculty Scholar with the Billy Graham Center of Evangelism. He has also been a visiting professor at St. Edmunds College, Cambridge University. He has a MDiv from Northern Baptist Seminary and a PhD in Intercultural Studies from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He recently served as President for the Academy for Evangelism in Theological Education and currently serves on the Planning Committee for the Mission Leadership Forums for the Overseas Ministries Study Center. Rick has published five books, numerous articles, and other resources. Rick seeks to bring together his passions for evangelism, prayer, and racial reconciliation in order to cast vision and equip an emerging postmodern generation in ministry for the sake of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

2:30 – 3:00 p.m. AETE Annual General Meeting

3:00 p.m. Adjournment

For more information see … http://aete.online/conference

COLLABORATION & What Happens When You Don’t Work With Others: A Bone to Pick #WSJ

Commentary by Dr. Whitesel: “Academic researchers tend to stay in their academic silos and not participate with other academic disciplines in their research. But research can be more reliable and valid when researchers work with other disciplines to foster ‘inter-disciplinary research.‘ For example, I recently suggested to my colleagues in the Academy for Evangelism in Theological Education (www.AETE.co) that we conduct our research on evangelism alongside sociologists, psychologists and other interested researchers. This can not only make our research more valid and reliable … but also more helpful. Read this story about the consequences that result when academics stay within their own research silos.”

A Bone to Pick

by NICHOLAS WADE, Wall Street Journal, 6/18/15.

Finding human fossils can be a contact sport, as researchers squeeze out competitors by denouncing them to the local authorities.

In 1912, the British paleoanthropological establishment was deceived into thinking that bones found at Piltdown were those of an early human ancestor. The specimen was promptly named Eoanthropus, or “dawn man,” amid general satisfaction that the earliest human had turned out to be British, not French or German. Perhaps feeling his prank had gone too far, the perpetrator of the Piltdown hoax then salted the site with an artifact that, if human credulity had any reasonable limits, should have brought the show to a close—a piece of elephant bone carved to resemble a cricket bat. But even this startling item was received without dissent, and the Piltdown skull hung around for another 40 years until modern methods proved it to be a forgery.

The Piltdown hoax is recounted in “The Strange Case of the Rickety Cossack” as a lesson in how easily paleoanthropologists—those who study human fossils—can be misled by notions that play to their prejudices. The author, Ian Tattersall, is himself a paleoanthropologist and has watched the antics of his profession for many years from a front-row seat at the American Museum of Natural History. His account of the field raises the wider issue of how, despite the supposed rigor of the scientific method, whole communities of scientists can occasionally be blown far off course by nonscientific motivations.

One of paleoanthropology’s problems, as Mr. Tattersall sees it, has been professional isolation from other sciences. From its beginnings in the 19th century, the subject was dominated by anatomists who paid minute attention to bone shapes and little to taxonomy or other relevant biological disciplines. These anatomists would make oracular pronouncements, which were basically intuitions beyond the reach of scientific analysis. One advised the young Mr. Tattersall that if he stared at the fossils for long enough, the bones would speak to him.

Read more at … http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-bone-to-pick-1434667925