As the Spring semester hits its halfway point, Biola students once again begin to prepare for the annual Cook Missions Conference, renamed last year in order to honor the legacy university’s former president Clyde Cook. In contrast to the annual Torrey Conference, the Cook Missions Conference is entirely student led and run. This year, the theme is “Children of Light,” with the directors being senior Journalism major Katie Ragains and senior Biology major Gabby Cole.
The two explained that the title for this year’s conference comes from Ephesians 5:8, while the theme as a whole comes from Romans 8:14-21.
“Ephesians 5:8 says you were once darkness, now you are light in the Lord, walk as children of light. And so, yeah, we took the title from that passage, because light goes forth, and so it makes that bridge between what it means to be children and to be missional,” said Cole.
“We really wanted to focus on the idea of our identity as children of God first, before we can start to approach the Great Commission,” added Ragains. “The theme every year for Missions Conference is kind of the Great Commission. We just have to try and find what angle of that we’re going to focus on. And so this year, we wanted to focus on our identity as children first.”
HOW DID THIS YEAR’S THEME SHAPE THE CONFERENCE?
The directors explained they wanted to ensure that the conference remained missionally focused, in spite of the more inward focused theme. To accomplish this, the two made sure to find speakers who would make the connection between one’s personal spiritual identity and the outward, missional focus of the conference.
“We have speakers that are talking about the topic of identity through the lens of missions, and I think that all of them are going to do that really well,” stated Ragains.
The same goes for the breakout sessions, which will be held in between the main speaker sessions on the first two days of the conference. The directors noted that, in these sessions, they wanted to emphasize the importance of integrating our missional identity as Christians into every aspect of our lives.
“Our breakout sessions are kind of split up. So the first day we have topics that are a lot more inward focused: topics dealing with shame and who God says you are. Then the second day, we have topics that are a lot more focused on, like different types of evangelism and how different types of majors can be used for the Great Commission. So we kind of wanted it to be that natural progression as well, from identity to missions,” Ragains explained.
As to the stations and events at Missions Conference, the directors remarked that they are particularly looking forward to the Global Awareness Room held at Missions Conference every year.
“This year we were kind of trying to reimagine it,” stated Ragains. “It’s been held in Kim’s dining room before, and this year it’s going to be held in the basement of Rose. They’re going to be doing a walk through room where you get to experience four different cultures and how they see how people interact with the gospel in those different cultures. Then, there will be a reflection room at the end.”
On the topic of global voices, the directors wanted to represent different perspectives in missional work, so they brought speakers from many diverse backgrounds.
“We have a couple people who are actually not American,” said Cole. “We’re super excited just to hear their voices and get that global perspective … Especially at Biola, we have so many international and global students, so we want to make sure that they feel represented. And also, it’s just so important that we do have global perspectives, especially in missions, because missions is a global thing.”
The directors strove to represent global voices and perspectives in other areas of the conference too, from speakers to activities to worship.
“We have Global Voices, and that is a scripture reading, so our passage will be read in many languages. And then we’ll have global worship, it will be — always one of my favorites — worship in different languages. And then we have performing arts, and this year we have the Panderistas, and they perform in Spanish chapel quite frequently, so we’re really excited to have them … Parade of Nations also is a big thing representing the different countries and their flags,” Cole explained.
WHAT DOES THIS CONFERENCE LOOK LIKE FOR STUDENTS PERSONALLY?
The directors hope that student engagement with missions will extend beyond the time of the three day conference, as being a child of God necessarily includes missional work.
“I think our desire is that whatever happens at conference would so impact [student’s] hearts that it really charges them to see the Great Commission as something that is a part of who they are as God’s children, and something that they can do no matter what their vocation or major is,” said Ragains.
“It’s a two sided coin, being children of God and also being missional. So I hope students walk away with that transformational understanding,” added Cole.
The two went on to explain that the idea of “missions” is beginning to change for this generation of students. Rather than only going on missions trips for the sake of evangelizing, many are bringing their vocation with them.
“I think that in general, we’re seeing a big shift towards vocational missions, so people who are actively in the workforce … [they’re] going and bringing a skill and doing something in their field, and that is the means by which they’re evangelizing,” said Ragains.
She also explained that around the world, the concept of what “missions” is has been shifting:
“I also think, just globally, that missions is kind of getting rethought in a lot of ways … [It’s] really sweet to see just like the way things are shifting, and I think that the global church is currently doing a better job than the Western Church at sending missionaries. So it’s really interesting to see those trends.”
Cole followed up this statement by explaining that missions is not just going overseas; missions is local too, and it starts where you’re at right now.
“We firmly believe missions starts where you are too. So we really want to encourage students: missions starts now. It’s not just when you go overseas, but it actually matters that you’re living missionally here as a Biola student on campus,” she said.
Cole further stated that students can get involved in local missions through the Student Mission Union (SMU), the missionary organization fair held by Biola, or at the local missions table that will be a part of the conference.
Even if students do not plan to go into traditional missions work, this year’s theme, and Missions Conference as a whole, is still important to student’s lives.
“I think a part of being a Child of Light is that it is intrinsically who you are to be a child of God,” said Ragains. “Because of that, like naturally, when you spend more time with God, that’s going to flow from you in everyday interactions, in any job that you’re in, in any major that you’re in … there’s a lot of dark spaces here too that need help, like school systems and workplaces.”
“Yeah, it doesn’t matter where you are, we are children of light, and light has an impact in the darkness everywhere,” affirmed Cole.
The directors ended by explaining what it means for Biolans, and Christians everywhere, to be children of light:
“Our passage in Romans talks about how we’re not meant to be slaves to fear, and because we’re children of God, we’re able to just like, walk in the glorious light of Christ. And … I think that practically means giving up anxiety. That means, like walking actively in kindness in the face of people who are being unkind, and acting as Christ did,” said Ragains. “And so really, I think it kind of looks like being a disciple of God, and like that starts in people’s hearts, and then that’ll change how we treat those around us. Because once we understand that, I think that makes us realize that everyone else around us is also a child of God, and so therefore we can treat them with kindness, and we can treat them with respect and like, treat them with value, because that’s who God created them to be.”
