New Faculty: Dr Alvin Tey

EAST welcomes Dr Alvin Tey as our newest resident faculty! We invited him to share with us some serious, some spiritual, and some fun things about himself and his family as he joins our EAST community.

1. Kindly share with us how you became a Christian, felt called to Christian ministry and finally, how God led you to serve at EAST.

I came from a Chinese ancestral worshipping family and became a Christian when I was 17 years old through a friend from Singapore Youth for Christ. In the years thereafter, I grew as a Christian and was discipled through the NavTeens ministry. In the small family church which I worship in, I also grew through serving in various ministries (including missions). It was through my church missions ministry that I first got acquainted with Operation Mobilisation (OM) in the early 2000s and started serving in mission trips to OM’s ministry among the Dalits (Untouchables) in South India.

I worked in the secular world for about 15 years in the government, business consulting and higher education sectors. In 2013, while on another mission trip to OM India, I felt the clear call of God to serve Him full-time among the poor and marginalised least-reached. My wife Kalene was already serving with Wycliffe and had been praying for God’s calling for our family. Hence Kalene and I joined OM as members in 2014 and served in OM Mercy Teams International’s transformational development ministries among poor and marginalised communities in Myanmar and Cambodia for 7 years. After 7 years serving in transformational development ministries, I went on to serve as Associate Area Leader in OM East Asia and led the People and Organisational Development team, equipping OM missionaries in East Asia through training, spiritual formation, member care and coaching.

I thank God for leading me to ministry with EAST. At a silent retreat in 2017, God strongly impressed upon me to ‘teach among the nations’, even though I was serving in the field with OM. I followed this prompting in faith and God subsequently led me to enrol in the PhD Intercultural Studies program at Biola University (while I continued to serve in OM). God also miraculously provided the finances for the program through scholarships. At the end of my PhD program in 2022, my PhD supervisor at Biola connected me with Dr Jenette Schubert who had approached my PhD supervisor, looking for an adjunct to teach intercultural studies in EAST. Hence, I taught an intensive course at EAST and thereafter I felt this was where God wanted me to fulfil His calling for me to ‘teach among the nations’.

2. Could you introduce your family members and share an interesting fact of each member, including one less known fact about yourself?

I have been married to Kalene for over 20 years. We met while studying in university in the UK. While Kalene and I share many interests, she is definitely more mathematical than me! She studied econometrics and mathematical economics in university and did economic forecasting in her first job. Kalene and I have a pair of 15-year-old twin girls, Natalie and Charlotte, and an 11-year-old boy, Josiah. Natalie is entrepreneurial and already has her own business on Instagram, while Charlotte is more organised and academic. Josiah was miraculously conceived after I prayed for another child and dedicated the child to God’s service (similar to Hannah’s vow to God in 1 Samuel 1:11). I like watching American sports, and support Boston’s teams, in particular the Boston Celtics (basketball) and Boston Red Sox (baseball).

3. Share your favourite bible passage or verse, and explain why it is your favourite.

My life verse is the Great Commandment in Mark 12:30 “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” I can be a task driven person at times, and I am always reminded by God that loving Him comes before all else. In other words, the Great Commandment comes before the Great Commission. God has also continually impressed upon me through this verse that there are different ways of loving Him (through one’s heart, soul, mind, strength) and I need to cultivate each of these different ways of loving Him. In recent years, loving God more in my heart and soul through spiritual formation and contemplation has become an important part of my life, besides understanding Him through my mind and serving Him with my strength and giftings.

Please view Dr Alvin Tey’s EAST Resident Faculty page for more details on his biodata.