AIIAS welcomes Dr. Francisco Gayoba to serve as a faculty member of the Theological-Historical Studies Department of the AIIAS Seminary, effective August 2022. Dr. Gayoba fills the faculty position left open by the departure of Dr. Remwil Tornalejo, who was called to serve as president of Mountain View College.
Gayoba was born in Iloilo, Central Philippines. He moved to the North Philippines after elementary school, graduating from Pasay City Adventist Academy. He graduated from Philippine Union College with a bachelor’s in History and Philosophy of Religion in 1982 and earned his Master of Pastoral Studies and Master of Theology (Systematic Theology) in the AIIAS Theological Seminary.
Gayoba served as a district pastor for eight years under the Central Luzon Conference and as a youth pastor of the Philippine International Church in what then was known as Philippine Union College, now the Adventist University of the Philippines (AUP). In 1990 he was called to the AIIAS Theological Seminary to study and prepare as a church history professor. He graduated in 1997 with his Doctor of Theology degree from the South East Asia Graduate School of Theology in Singapore, focusing on church history in Asia. As part of his twelve years of teaching work in the AIIAS Seminary, Gayoba also served as a program director of the Master of Arts in Religion.
In 2006, Gayoba accepted the call to return to his home union, the North Philippine Union Conference (NPUC), to serve as ministerial secretary and Adventist Mission Director. His work involved promoting spirituality among pastors and their families, improving the level of pastoral ministry and leadership, and laying an evangelistic strategy in NPUC. Gayoba was elected as executive secretary of NPUC in 2010. He has participated in speaking engagements for numerous convocations, retreats, evangelistic meetings, conferences, and camp meetings in the Philippines and Europe. His passions, in addition to leadership development, are evangelism and church renewal. He desires to see the church returning to its biblical mission and spiritual formation practices rooted in God’s Word.
In April 2011, Gayoba was elected president of AUP, returning to the academic environment and serving there for eleven years. As the president of AUP in Silang, Cavite, he led the recovery of university land subject to property development projects that were disadvantageous to the university. He led the institution through the founding of the College of Medicine and steered the university as it met the financial and personnel challenges of implementing the K-12 program. Under his leadership, the school qualified to meet the stringent requirements of remaining an Autonomous University. He guided the construction of buildings and facilities to support the university’s growth, and led the institution through the crises Taal Volcano eruption in 2020 and the COVID-19 pandemic. During his term, the university finalized the sale of a portion of idle farmlands, positioning it to finance the construction of a 150-bed training hospital. With this track record, he brings a wealth of leadership experience to contribute in his return to AIIAS.
Gayoba is married to Arlene Gayoba, a training officer in the Human Resource Office of AUP. Together they are blessed with two grown children, Francis Ray, who is serving as the head chaplain of the AUP Campus Ministries Office while teaching and handling research for the College of Theology, and Marikit Anne Valenzuela, who serves in the Records and Admissions Office.
