Didache Vol 16 Number 3

Didache: Faithful Teaching 16:3 Introduction

Dean G. Blevins, Sr. Editor

Greetings and welcome to Didache: Faithful Teaching. This edition represents a unique third edition of the journal within a given publishing year. Due to the publication of articles as a resource for the USA/Canada regional theology conference, the journal possessed enough submissions to offer this third edition independent of the conference. This edition includes a number of new, young, scholars, several Spanish language submissions, and a unique audio podcast that reflects an emerging mindset of millennial pastors in the United States and Canada.

 The edition opens with three theological treatises by emerging scholars in the Church of the Nazarene. Jonathan Platter opens with a research article addressing both time and eternity as theological concepts that surface in and through the sacrament of baptism. Platter offers a means of reconciling how eternity and time exist from within the Trinity. Jonathan serves as an adjunct professor at Southern Nazarene University while completing doctoral studies at Cambridge. The edition then includes two articles addressing the issue of racism, particularly as it is manifested in the United States. Timothy Hahn addresses this burgeoning issue through a historical lens, calling the church to remember racial injustice via the cross and also the lynching tree. Tim’s article serves as the recipient of the 2016 Tom Nees Social Justice Award at Nazarene Theological Seminary. Our thanks to Dean Roger Hahn at NTS for providing this publication alongside previous recipients. In addition, NTS student Jason Phelps offers another academic essay invoking a more personal approach in conversation with Martin Luther King. Phelps addresses a view of reconciliation, anchored in the atonement, that merges communal and personal relationality. Our thanks to Dr. K. Steve McCormick for recommending this article to the journal.

The journal then turns to research that crosses global cultures, particularly Spanish language efforts. The first article by Reverend Simone Twibell addresses questions around the long term impact of short term missions (STM) globally. Reverend Twibell is currently completing a doctoral program in Intercultural Studies at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. In the paper Simone offers both careful criticisms and also practical responses in short term missions. Dr. Dorothy Bullón (DMin Nazarene Theological Seminary) provides an academic review of key theorists who sought to discern the efficacy, or manipulation, of religious experience in times of revival. Dr. Bullón’s graciously offers this article in both English and Spanish language editions for our readership.

In addition, we are indebted to Dr. Joanne Solis-Walker for two new Spanish language articles from the Wesleyan church. Dr. Solis-Walker serves as Director of Latin@ Education & Adjunct Professor at Wesley Seminary at Indiana Wesleyan University. She writes,

The following two articles in Spanish provide a summary of the 2016 World Evangelical Alliance Global Consultation hosted in Panama. Dr. Samuel Pagan, a biblical scholar and adjunct professor at Seminario Wesley, engages the role of the bible in informing the events that would happen in Panama 10 years before this consultation.  The second article is presented by Rev. Daniel Diaz, a Master of Divinity student at Seminario Wesley.

 

Each of these articles approaches the topic of polycentric missions. Panama 2016 created the opportunity to discuss the 100 year missions consultation held in 1916 in Panama City. This was crucial given the events held in Edinburgh 1914, where the Latin America, regarded as Catholic, was part of the global evangelization vision of reaching the world for Christ. Scholars, pastors, missionaries and others representing the church gathered in Panama 1914 to further strategize how to reach Latin America. The implications of these meetings were immense and much of the spiritual awakening Latin America experienced traces back to these events. It was therefore appropriate for the WEA 14th Global Consultation to take place in Panama and the discussions focused on the shift occurring in missions from the center to a polycentric move, from all nations to all nations. 

Our final submission actually comes from a unique podcast series titled “This Nazarene Life” (TNL). Producer Brit Bolerjack designed the podcast to offer a voice to rising millennial pastors, and their mentors, primarily in the United States and Canada. Our edition includes an interview with Dr. Deirdre Brower-Latz, Principal of NTC-Manchester. Podcasts like TNL reflect a different approach to capturing an understanding of millennial pastors (a theme we addressed in Didache 15:2) which will prove particularly important now that millennials occupy the largest demographic in the United States of America according to Pew Research Center.  

Producer Bolerjack notes,

This Nazarene Life is a grassroots podcast featuring stories of young Nazarene clergy and their role models. We produce these stories so that older clergy can hear the passion of young pastors, and young clergy can know they are not alone. In late 2016, This Nazarene Life launched Young Clergy Conference--a conference for young pastors coming to Oklahoma City March 26-28, 2017.

You can find out more about the podcast at thisnazlife.com, and the complementary conference at youngclergycon.com. TNL Season 2 commences this Spring, 2017.

As always, please note the journal publishes articles along the themes of theology, culture, and education within a Wesleyan heritage. Guidelines for submissions are available at the website.  Professors may also submit outstanding student papers (with student permission) as long as they will agree to serve as the reviewer.

I again thank Ernalyn Longcop Fausto, with the staff of the Asia Pacific Region, who works diligently in the formatting and maintenance of our website, and Dr. Tammy Condon who works tirelessly promoting Didache: Faithful Teaching, as she does in the development of the Wesleyan Holiness Digital Library (WHDL) https://www.whdl.org/.

Table of Contents

pdf Didache: Faithful Teaching 16:3 Introduction (806 KB) by Dean G. Blevins

pdf Baptism & Beatitude: Taking Time and Partaking of the Eternal (346 KB) by Jonathan Platter

pdf Lest We Forget Thine Agony: Racial Reconciliation, Memory, and the Wounds of Christ (128 KB) by Timothy L P Hahn; Recipient The Tom Nees Students Lectures On Social Justice

pdf Racial Reconciliation: A Communal Process (277 KB) , by Jason Phelps

pdf Short-Term Missions: Making a Long-Lasting Difference in Today’s World (144 KB) by Simone Twibell

pdf A Debate on the Issue of Religious Experience in Times of Revivals (138 KB) by Dorothy Bullón

pdf Un Debate Sobre la Experiencia Religiosa en Tiempos de Avivamiento (149 KB) by Dorothy Bullón

pdf Panamá 2016: Nuestro Desafío Hispano En Una Misión Policéntrica (79 KB) by Daniel Diaz

pdf Congreso Misionero en Panama 1916: Lecturas Bíblicas e Implicaciones Misioneras Luego de 100 Años (165 KB) by Samuel Pagán

audio This Nazarene Life Podcast: An Interview with Dierdre Brower-Latz (611 KB) produced by Brit Bolerjack