Student Missionary Union revealed the much-anticipated details of this week’s Missions Conference in chapel this morning. Here is a recap, plus some details you might not know yet, straight from Missions Conference director Cody Nord.
Theme
The theme is “Echo” and students are encouraged to use #Echo14 in their social media posts during the conference, Nord said.
“We believe we have been called to the story of God, are compelled to make disciples in the context of the local church, being rooted in the story and compelled to live a life on mission that will be an echo of our obedience heard and felt to the ends of the earth,” Nord said.
This year’s three main theme passages are Genesis 12, Matthew 28 and Revelation 5, Nord said.
Speakers
“Our main seminar speakers are Mickey Klink, Roderick Gilbert, Megan Fate-Marshman and Afshin Ziafat,” Nord said.
The Missions Conference staff chose these speakers based on four categories of people they wanted to interpret the theme: academic, pastoral, practical and global. The four speakers apply to these categories respectively, according to Nord.
Professors from different departments and six presidents of mission organizations will also speak at workshops.
Website and app
SMU is launching an independent website for Missions Conference for the first time this year at www.biolamissionsconference.com. All conference information can be found there.
Also, for the first time, SMU has an app for student convenience. Unlike Torrey Conference’s first app, which was created by a student last semester, this app was purchased at a flat rate and adapted. The intuitive interface provides alerts, color-coded full schedules and descriptions, a campus map, a Twitter feed and more.
Students can click on the event they want to attend in the calendar on the app and add it their schedule, Nord said. This gives students the ability to plan their schedules ahead of time.
“[The app is] probably one of the best things we’ve invested in this year,” Nord said.
The app, called “ECHO 2014,” is free and available for all smartphones under the search “Biola Missions Conference.”
App saves 90 percent of program printing funds
Since SMU is not printing programs this year, which cost between $3,000 and $5,000, SMU saves about 90 percent of the funds they would have used for printing programs by investing in the app template, which cost about $400.
“We’ve been able to invest a lot of that money we would have used for booklets and stuff into different places,” Nord said.
Despite the lack of detailed programs, students without smartphones can still access a simplified version of the schedule on postcards. These will be available at main sessions and in the SMU office.
Fewer seminars and workshops, still plenty of credits
Though there will be fewer seminars and workshops than last year and no double credit events except for one on Friday, Nord promises there will still be plenty of credit opportunities.
“If you hit everything on Wednesday, you can get six credits the first day. Last year the only thing they did double credits with was a seminar that was a little bit longer, but it wasn’t as great as we wanted it,” Nord said.
Nord promises that where they lack in quantity this year they make up in quality of each event.
“One of the best seminars we’re going to have is where Dr. Oakes and Dr. Thoennes are going to be speaking about adoption, and they’re bringing their families,” Nord said. “They’re bringing their little adopted children and they’re going to be speaking about grace and adoption. How much better does it get than that?”
It’s time to get excited
Nord encourages students to tweet using #Echo14, download the app and anticipate great things from Missions Conference 2014.
“I’ve been dying! I’ve been wanting to tell everyone but I couldn’t tell anyone except everyone who already knows. I want to get excited about this,” Nord said.
