Central Avenue Christian Church Wigston
Saved to Serve
The Life of Brian
Dr Brian Jennings PhDis our Missionary in Africa. He has been working for many years at Ghana Christian College located in Accra. The college runs several undergraduate and post-graduate courses training locals to run churches in their own context.
Brian has just gained (July 2007) his Doctoral Thesis.
A bit about Brian
There are two aspects to my work with Ghana Christian University
College. As a lecturer I teach, largely at degree level, in the areas
of philosophy, religions, ethics, theology, and church history. This
is the 'chalk-face' work in which I help prepare Christian leaders for
service in a huge variety of situations. In particular many of our
graduates labour sacrificially in Ghana's rural communites. I also play
a significant role in the academic administration of the University as
a member of the Academic Affairs Committee. I coordinated GCUC's
successful application for validation with the University of Wales
which means I've had to become familiar with the details of academic
regulation and quality assurance. In the future, once I have finished
my PhD, my responsibilities may come to include post-graduate teaching
and coordination and supervision of postgraduate and institutional
research.
It's not possible to talk about my contribution to Christian mission
apart from the role of the University. I believe that Ghana is at a new
stage of evangelisation. There is a ground-swell of faith in the
country and many strong Bible based churches already exist, a number of
which are led by our graduates. The work of primary evangelism is
completed in many parts of Ghana. The next stage of mission is to embed
the Gospel and its truth and values deeply in the local cultures of
Ghana so that we see the emergence of a Christian world view and a
Christian morality that will transform the social fabric of Ghana so
that it might become a beacon of God's grace to other lands. I believe
that Ghana Christian University has a crucial ministry to nurture the
African leaders who will pioneer these changes in church and society
over the next fifty years.
The Lord sent me to Ghana some seventeen years ago and has given the
unique knowledge, skills, and experience to support the University in
the new phase of its ministry, both through teaching and in working
behind the scenes as part of the team ensuring academic quality and
innovation. As to how long I'll be needed in this role - that's up to
the Lord as only He has the master-plan!
A bit about Ghana
Ghana is a county of twenty million people on the West Coast of Africa
just north of the equator - in geographical terms it is about the same
size as England. The economy here is largely agricultural. Ghana grows
the most beautiful pineapples and bananas you will ever taste and its
main exports are cocoa and gold.
Ghana was formerly the British colony of the Gold Coast and was the
first country in Africa to gain its independence from colonial rule
under the leadership of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah in 1957. For most of the
years since its independence Ghana has been ruled by a series of
military governments some of which were extremely corrupt and ruined
the country. Ghana's economy began to recover in the 1990s under the
rule of Flight Lieutenant J. J. Rawlings who returned the country to
democratic rule in 1992. Ghana is now a stable democracy led by
President John Kuffour who was first elected in December 2000 - the
first time political leadership had changed hands through the ballot
box in Ghana.
While Ghana had contact with the Gospel from the end of sixteenth
century the Church was only really established from the 1820s and 1830s
through the efforts Presbyterian and Methodist missionaries who
evangelised much of southern Ghana. In the twentieth century they were
joined my a host of other Churches and their missions. In more recent
years Ghana has seen a huge growth in African Initiated and Pentecostal
Churches.
A bit about the college
Ghana Christian University College was founded in 1966 as Ghana
Christian College with a mission to provide leadership education for
the many Churches in Ghana that had no seminaries of their own. For
many years the College provided programmes in theology at degree and
diploma level and finally gained accreditation from the National
Accreditation Board of the Ministry of Education of he Republic of
Ghana in 1998.
In May of this year the College gained validation from the University
of Wales and in August a new School of Community Development was opened
to operate alongside the existing School of Theology. These
developments have allowed the institution to upgrade its status to that
of a University College in time for the fortieth anniversary of its
founding. The University's mission has now enlarged to provide
Christian leaders for the development of Ghana's many local communities
as well as for the growth and direction of the nation's churches. It is
the University's vision that such transformed and transforming
leadership will transform the nation and its cultures.
Office Address:
102 Central Avenue
Wigston
Leiscestershire