i t T T 7 ILL you go ?” “Will you y y send one?” These questions were thoughtfully and en thusiastically answered by the student body o f the Bible Institute and the membership and friends o f the Church o f the Open Door in the twenty-first Annual Missionary Con ference, held this year from April 16-23, with over fifty home and for eign mission boards participating. To Biola students, this was an op portunity to learn the facts and meth ods o f world-wide missions, and to discuss candidate qualifications with experienced missionary statesmen. This year, speakers at the confer ence included Dr. David H. Johnson, executive secretary o f the Evangelical Alliance Mission; Dr. James Cuth- bertson, Japan Evangelistic Band; Dr. H. M. Griffin, North America Direc tor of the China Inland Mission, and Dr. W. Cameron Townsend, o f Wy- cliffe Bible Translators. A morning symposium on the scope and problems o f missions under the direction o f Dr. Cuthbertson proved most helpful to the students. Here questions were answered extempo raneously by missionaries and mission executives. This, combined with hours o f personal counseling, many mission ary addresses and films, Dr. Talbot’s recent pictures of Biola around the world and forty-six colorful mission ary booths, gave the students a well- rounded background for personal decision on the question, “Who will g o ? ” Said one student, “ I’ve felt called to the mission field for a long time. This is my last year at Biola and I have been looking forward, all year to the Missionary Conference. I want to find out all I can about specific fields.” According to a recent survey, there are 260 Biola students definitely look ing forward to foreign missionary service. This does not include those who are committed to work among the Indians or the mountain and rural people o f North America, those plan ning to go into pastorates, or into other forms o f organized Christian work. The missionary conference is today a co-operative venture of the school and the church. It grew out o f the dark depression days o f 1930. and was for several years solely a church affair, under the leadership o f the missionary committee with Mr. Wil- J U N E, 1 95 0
A REPORT OF THE 1950 MISSIONARY CONFERENCE By Margaret Jacobsen
liam Nyman, chairman. Twenty mis sionaries were supported by the Church o f the Open Door in those days. The missionary budget was $12,000. In the face of hard times, the people voted to double that num ber. In 1933, 27 missionaries were supported; today the goal is one hun dred. The church now actually has one hundred and thirty-five members in full-time missionary service, and as sumes full or partial support for 81 o f these. The famous map of the world, which has become the focal point of interest in the interior of the church, was the child o f necessity. Years ago the front of the church needed redecorating. There was not enough money in the church treasury to paint the entire interior, but something had to be done about the front. Mrs Ford Canfield
suggested that a map o f the world be painted there, with a marker indicating the location of each mis sionary from the church. So, again God worked all things together for good. This map has proved to be one o f the greatest incentives to mission ary endeavor that has come to the church or to the school and it has at tracted attention all over the world. Today, the Church o f the Open Door has a missionary budget o f over $75,000. The offerings o f the Wednes day night Bible study class go directly into the missionary budget o f the church. The annual missionary confer ences give church members an oppor tunity to meet in person their own missionaries about whom they have heard so much, and it inspires the whole church and school to prayer and giving and going. It is the missionary high light o f the year.
Church of the Open Door Auditorium with famous missionary map and missionary conference decorations.
Page Seventeen
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