The Church’s Role with Returnees from China
Suggestions are given for practical ways in which churches can help ease the transition of cross-cultural workers returning from China to their home country.
Scholarship
In-depth academic and theological research.
Latest
Debriefing before the Final Goodbye
The author provides debriefing questions that can assist in evaluating life in China and aid in healthy transitions.
Kids in Transition
An experienced, cross-cultural worker shares important factors that helped his children make a positive transition from Chinese to US culture.
Opportunities and Challenges When Foreign Workers Leave China
A Chinese author reflects on the positives and negatives that leaders, seminaries, and churches face when cross-cultural workers leave the country.
History: It’s Essential
Strong faith is built upon history. Knowledge and reflection on history are essential for the church and for those who serve.
Fragmented and Complacent
The Chinese church’s lack of historical consciousness is longstanding. While the secular world has increased its understanding of history in many areas, the church has lagged behind. Only recently has research into church history begun. As it becomes known, the church needs to recognize that history has practical applications and must learn how to apply these. When this does not happen, there are negative effects, and the author discusses some of these.
Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Christianity
A significant resource, this website offers the names and life stories of significant figures in Chinese Christianity including those who pioneered and nurtured the churches, led independent Christian movements, and applied biblical values to Chinese social and political challenges across the centuries and around the world.
Ecclesiology, History, and the Identity of the Chinese Church
Using a historical approach, this book looks at the early stages of the Three-Self Patriotic Movement (TSPM) and Chinese Protestant Christians’ responses to changing church-state relations from 1949-1958. The author proposes that to understand the conflicts between the early stages of TSPM and the Chinese church leaders, theology and Christian identity are significant factors. This work provides valuable insights to keep in mind while studying the history of Chinese Christianity.
Towards More Effective Youth Ministry
The 2015 Survey on the Current Situation and Future Prospects for the Church in China, undertaken by the China Gospel Research Alliance, indicated that pastoring the next generation is a priority for Christian leaders in China. The needs of youth in China are great and the church in China must reach and minister to them or risk losing the next generation of believers—which will not just be the loss of individual believers but also the potential loss of Christian families and church leaders.
Toward an Urban Church Theology
When I wrote China’s Urban Christians: A Light that Cannot be Hidden, it was with the conviction that massive urbanization in China had significant implications for China’s church. The emergence of a new kind of church in the city was not merely an extension of the experience of China’s primarily rural house church movements or of churches affiliated with the TSPM. Rather, a fresh set of dynamics was impacting the development of China’s newly forming urban Christian communities.
The latest issue of ChinaSource Quarterly, with its theme of urban church theology, delves into these dynamics. Guest editors Mary Ma and LI Jin have pulled together an impressively well-rounded look at the increasingly complex urban church environment.
Affluenza: A Documentary on Urban Consumerism
A look at the affects of affluence on American society with a view to better understanding what is happening in China today.
The City and the Church
As China becomes increasingly urbanized, an urban theology for ministry is needed. As modern man finds himself slowly enmeshed in urban living, he experiences materialism, relativism, and an increasingly segmented society. He questions what is real and true, and who God is. These questions can become points of contact for urban ministry. Dr. Ma provides some guidelines for forming an urban theology for ministry in urban China.