Written by Nicole Miller When we hear the words “mission,” and “ministry,” our minds tend to automatically drift to the unreached people groups of Asia and Africa. Especially within the American Church, the concept of ministry is often so closely associated with spreading the Gospel and serving people abroad that we can forget about our local communities, neighborhoods, and cities. In Acts 1:8, Jesus delivers the Great Commission, declaring, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” As believers, we are called to go and…
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Eyes to Behold
Written by Augusta McDonnell “If there’s anything that has reinforced my love for God beyond the Bible, it’s the skillful, calculated, scientific way of observing creation my dad opened to me,” explains Lloyd Peckham, linguistics professor at Biola University. “Dad showed me my first sunrise; he showed me the colors changing as the sun came up.” Peckham’s dad, Robert, was a high school science teacher. His family had a hobby of mineral collecting. They would go out to mines and other places with friends to observe the chemical molecular orderliness of minerals that display God’s beauty. When Peckham was 14, his dad obtained a year-long sabbatical tasked with going to…
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From a Single Thread: Turning Passion into Action
Written by Tayllor Lemphers Light laughter, soothing conversation, excited exclamation – the melodic sound of women in community. Another sound is woven amidst the female voices, a steady rhythm: the clicking of knitting needles. A single strand of yarn is looped over and over the metal instruments, adept hands orchestrating them in a well-rehearsed routine. Through the process, that single strand is evolving into a circular form. All around the room, infinity scarves of every hue are piled. Sitting among the other women, Sarah Sjoberg pauses her knitting and surveys the scene around her – the many skillfully-crafted scarves, the friends surrounding her, and the needles in her hands. A…
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Own Your Stuff: Treasuring not Trashing
Written by Kahlie Colwell Two Camelback water bottles. A $25 dollar gift card to JCPenney. Brand new Nike Ruckus Low shoes. An Oreck vacuum. Unopened beef jerky. A Timbuk2 bag worth $100. An espresso machine. A $10 bill. These items represent just a tiny sampling of stuff found by Biola alumnus Parker Gross during a dumpster diving expedition around Biola’s dorms during finals week. While scavenging, Gross snagged everything that was in good and useable condition, compiling a list of unwanted and wasted goods that was valued at over $2,000. The sheer amount of stuff Gross found is overwhelming. If you are anything like Gross, such an extravagant example of…
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A Day on the Metro
Written by Steve Day “Ready to run?” I ask, looking directly at Summer. A grimace crosses her face and she clutches her camera closer to her chest. We are still two or three minutes from Union Station – southbound on the gold line. A flash of lightning illuminates the sky, startling us. A rapturous clap of thunder follows. Andrea, a Lincoln Heights local with pink curly hair, three inches of dark regrowth, plug earrings and a polished leopard-print upper lip piercing, squeals with excitement. None of us can remember the last time a storm like this came through Los Angeles. Andrea introduces herself, taking care to roll the ‘r’ in…
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A Letter from Your Editor
A 10-foot, turquoise nylon kite lay on the beach in front of me, the frequent gusts of wind causing it to hover slightly over the sand. A tangle of red, white and blue lines extended from the sides of the kite and attached in some complicated way to the short bar I now held in my hands. The conditions were perfect, or at least that is what Jesse told me. I looked out at an ocean of advancing white caps that dotted the clear, blue water, the palms swayed on the beach around me and grains of sand danced about. Nothing was left untouched by the ripping wind. I had…
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More than a Song: The Story of Singspiration
Written by Brittany Cervantes The music echoes throughout the room, resounding in your soul as the band plays their instruments and everyone around you joins in, singing. Suddenly, your foot begins to tap to the beat of the music and you lift your hands up, praising the Lord. This experience, known as the long-standing tradition, Singspiration, has become a typical Sunday night for many students. This beloved hour of worship was given the name Singspiration to reflect its ultimate purpose — to inspire students to worship God. With a legacy that extends back decades, each Singspiration chapel still brings the Biola community together as one body, praising the name of…
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A Letter from Your Editor
Photography by Alissa Sandoval When I looked out at the coral reef from inside my kayak, it was not anything impressive. I was able to spot a few rocks poking through the surface of the water and peer down at some sort of dark shapes, but that section of ocean basically looked like any other. That all changed once I got out and jumped in. Streams of sunlight beamed down from above, illuminating an active and colorful other world. Yellow, white, blue and silver fish darted in and out of the coral. Octopuses slinked in the shadows, while sea turtles chilled near the surface. Then, with a flash of silver…
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Outrunning My Shame
Photography by Meagan Garton Written by Tayllor Lemphers In theory, every muscle in my body should have been screaming in agony. In theory, every shallow breath should have wracked my lungs. In theory, my legs should have felt like dead weights, resisting my knee-drive forward, and my arms should have felt like lead as I pumped them faster. However, theory failed to apply as I pushed my body forward into the final corner of the track at Azusa Pacific University. As I propelled myself into the last 100 meters of the 400m final of the 2012 GSAC Championships, my body was anything but heavy, my breath anything but ragged, my…
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Commuter Crossing
Photography by Paige Bocianski Written by Grace Kim It is the first week of school. During this fast-paced, exhilarating time, we find ourselves asking our fellow new students the same three introductory questions: What is your name? What is your major? And, where do you dorm? Students who live on campus eagerly answer these questions without hesitation, whereas commuters may pause before answering the last question. “I do not live on campus; I am a commuter,” they may respond. “Oh,” is all the residential student usually responds with. This answer has become so typical that Katie Tuttle, Director of Commuter Life at Biola University, has coined this interaction with the…
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Made Well: A Glimpse at the Theology of Fashion
Photography by Daniel Lambert Written by Kristina Nishi Say the word “fashion” and you will get a variety of responses. Some people enjoy it and voraciously flip through any magazine on the subject. Others shake their heads in dismay at the different and sometimes confusing trends. However, fashion is not just about clothing, but also style, mannerisms and customs — it has much deeper roots and implications than you might think. In the past four decades, fashion has exploded onto the scene, dictating the design of society. Now more than ever, people use fashion as a means of branding, to differentiate themselves from the crowd. Magazines such as Vogue, People…
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Living Frame by Frame
Photography by Meagan Garton Written by Thomas Harlander The night air is warm and the sand is cool. As we walk to the shoreline, the first wave builds, peaks, tips and crashes. And it lights up blue-green. Bioluminescent algae cause the effect, but in the moment that seems irrelevant. We enter the water, the surface of the ocean stretching away until it falls over the horizon, dropping off into starry space. A dark swell eases toward us, rising. Then it caves over itself and bursts into a neon avalanche of froth, enveloping my field of vision as it rushes over me. Looking down, we find that our bodies glow as…
