| dc.description.abstract | The Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) Church exists for mission—communicating
the “everlasting gospel” of Revelation 14:6-12 as mandated by Christ (Matt 28:19,
20) to the world. The young people with their youthful energies and zeal, who should
be at the forefront of this mission enterprise, are disabled by the unemployment
problem which denies them the opportunity of living up to their God-given potentials.
Though a global problem, the African context with growing youth population and
reducing job opportunities may be worse hit by this debilitating problem, which is
getting worse with time.
Because of the multifaceted nature of the problem, this dissertation designed
and implemented a training model—a synergy of mission and livelihood skills that
would empower the youth and at the same time unleash their potentials for
involvement in the mission of the church.This research used the mixed methodology: qualitative and quantitative. Part
of the study of the SDA Church in Cote d’Ivoire and the phenomenon of youth
unemployment in Cocody-Philadelphia SDA Church were done qualitatively while
the quantitative approach was used for the pre and post-training surveys. The study
revealed that the problem of youth unemployment that was regarded as
socioeconomic had significant theological and missiological implications. Therefore,
the SDA Church should be involved in tackling it to reduce the prevalence among its
youth membership.
Samples of interventions and models from the different economic strata of the
globe were examined; in addition, initiatives by faith-based organizations were
studied. The gap which this study discovered was the absence of, or minimal
application of the spiritual dimension into these models—which this project seeks to
accomplish by adopting a holistic approach.
The strategy adopted for this project was the synergy of mission and
livelihood skills that may reduce youth unemployment in the SDA Churches in
Abidjan and at the same time unleash their potentials for involvement in mission.
Contacts with the focus group showed that they are aware of the problem and wanted
something to be done about it. The researcher administered the pre-training survey to
determine the prevalence of the problem. The result showed that of a sample group of
34 youth who took the survey, about 74% were unemployed which confirmed the
focus group position.
The intervention was a Training of Trainers (TOT) program whose
participants were selected from the churches at Abidjan based on their academic
qualification—a minimum of a high school graduate. The package for the training
consists of three major modules: inculcation, livelihood skill, and entrepreneurial skills. After the training, participants were given materials that would enable them
replicate the program. At a post-training survey, 86% of trainees indicated the ability
to replicate the training with minimal or no assistance.
With this capacity building training in place, about twenty persons can train in
youth empowerment whereas there was none before the training. The youth director
of Cote d’Ivoire Conference would galvanize the efforts of these trainees to train
youth in the church at Abidjan and beyond. The more youth unemployment is reduced
the more mission is enhanced. | en_US |
