A Brief History
In March 2009 documents were submitted to the Kenyan government and in July 2010, the Africa Society of Evangelical Theology (ASET) was officially registered as a society. ASET is a professional society that fosters evangelical theological scholarship in Africa and facilitates collegial relationships among scholars and practitioners of Christianity in the continent.
ASET has a clear vision for itself to:
- encourage research among African scholars of Christianity
- provide a platform for that research to reach a wider audience within Africa and around the world
- create a context where evangelical perspectives on issues facing the African church and society are addressed
- create a context for fellowship and networking among its members
The society also has well-defined values of:
- Faithfulness to the Bible
- Professional ethics
- Creative and critical thinking
- Christ-like humility
- Community of scholars encouraging, respecting and learning from one another
- Development and inspiration of young scholars
These objectives and core values gives ASET a firm foundation in its operations that enables it to successfully function as an agent of blessing within the theological academy in Africa. More than just words in a founding document, they are guiding principles that inform and shape ASET, it’s work and it’s annual conferences.
ASET Series
The Africa Society of Evangelical Theology has teamed up with Langham to produce the ASET Series, publishing the best papers from the society’s annual conferences, filling a significant gap in the literature of Christianity. As the centre of the global church moves towards the Majority World, this series shows that similarly, the centre of Christian scholarship is moving in the same direction.
The first book in the series, Christianity and Suffering: An African Perspective is an excellent opening to this project, building on work for the 5th Annual Conference in 2015.
Featuring contributions from 13 different scholars the chapters confront issues of suffering ranging from poverty and death to witchcraft and the prosperity gospel within the structure of three parts addressing suffering in Africa, the Christian response and theodicy, in turn. The result of the work of these men and women is a rich, vibrant and robust exploration of this universal aspect of humanity that incisively examines the reality of suffering and offers a hopeful way through the complexity of human existence, both theologically and experientially. Visit our online shop to buy Christianity and Suffering today.
Work has already started on editing the next publication in the series, based on papers from the 2016 conference on African contextual realities.
Africa Society of Evangelical Theology 2018 Annual Conference
This year the 8th annual conference is being held from 9-10th March at St Paul’s University, Limuru, Kenya and renowned scholar and Langham author, Prof Samuel Ngewa is the keynote speaker. The title for the conference is “God and Creation In Contemporary Christian Theological Discourse”. Topics that were listed in the call for papers included, among others, God and history, Religion and science, and God and his activities in contemporary society.
If you are interested in attending this year’s conference then please email Dr Gregory Crofford at asetsecretary@gmail.com.
More information about ASET, past conferences and contact information can be found on its Facebook page.