PREFACE

This booklet was written in 1986 as a tool for teaching the Missiology classes to the students of Sudan Theological College.  When I went into South Sudan as a Professor of Physics in the University of Juba, I had the least idea I would be involved in teaching of Theology in a Theological College.  It is story of how God uses an itinerant teacher to bring about a revival in an area where others are not able to enter easily.  Juba University was situated in Juba, in South Sudan and the majority of the students were Christians.  There were two established churches, the Anglican Church and the Roman Catholic Church.  I started a Bible Study group in the University Campus which attracted lot of students.  Meanwhile Pastor Adi Ambrose and Brother Benjamin were having a regular Pentecostal group which met every Sunday in the corridor of a School and I was invited into. The Anglican brothers took me to various High Schools in South Sudan where we were able to talk to the students.  With the three of us together with the encouragement of the clergies in the Anglican tradition we attracted a large group of believers and a revival broke out.  This led to the establishment of the Sudan Pentecostal Churches which moved into a tarpaulin covered tent in the courtyard of a house which we rented.  In six years time it grew up into twenty six assemblies all over South Sudanese villages. I still remember the hand of friendship extended by now Bishop Seme of the Anglican Church.  Eventually with the help of the Swedish Free Mission the Sudan Theological College was started just outside the city of Juba in traditional Tukuls.  Most foreigners shied away from organized teaching since it attracted the attention of the Islamic North.  Personally I found my Sudanese colleagues in the University along with the Islamic Students group very cooperative and surprisingly helpful in every step. 

The Summer Institute of Linguistics group had their guest house next door to my University House where we had lot of fellowship and encouragement. 

The training of the missionaries became an important area both for the Theological College and also for those missionaries who came to South Sudan under other Missions.  This course material was developed to meet the need.  With the scanty resource materials and the wealth of experience of a vast number of missionaries who came into the land essentially to do translation work and to help the country economically pooled into this teaching material.

This was a one semester course in the Sudan Theological College after which they went into the field and came back with great results.  I have used this material for short term missionary training course to those who came on short term mission work.

 Considering that it was written over twenty years ago in a place far from all theological academics, with little of no resources or libraries, the book now seems impossibly modern.  I have touched up a little and added tables and details.

The land and the people are no longer in existence.  The University of Juba has been relocated to Khartoum.  The Pentecostal Church and the people of God had been scattered into all parts of Sudan and South Africa.  I was forced not to return to Juba because of the war situation in 1990.

One of my first students who went out into the field and brought in lot of harvest was Pastor Immanuel Waigo.  He was a missionary with zeal, filled with the Spirit and proficient in the Word.  He and his wife were forced to flee to Kenya where I have been told that he died leaving behind his wife. 

This book is dedicated to the memory one of God’s dear son  -- Immanuel Waigo - whose memory will remain with me to the end of my life.

Prof. M.M.Ninan

San Jose, CA 95124

August 4, 2009

Prof.  M. M. Ninan and Pastor Immanuel Waigo
in the Sudan Theological College Campus 1989

We stand in owe before the great children of God

Knowing that we had the privilege of touching them.

PREFACE

This outline on Christian Cultural Anthropology in the context of the South Sudanese culture is written as a course outline for the Sudan Theological College, Juba, South Sudan. It was written with Sudanese Evangelists and Pastors in mind to help them to understand their own culture and to understand the cultures of their neighboring tribes and clans. There is much that can be done by way of research which will help these men of God to sow the word of God among all the tribes of the South Sudan.

“You will receive power, when the Holy Spirit comes on you and you shall be my witnesses......''

Prof.M.M.Ninan

Juba, The Sudan

25-7-1986