SAN ANTONIO – In two challenging and inspiring sessions Thursday, the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship’s We Love Missions conference kicked off three-days of equipping Christians and churches for ministry at Trinity Baptist Church in San Antonio, Texas.

The overarching theme of the conference is answering God’s call to love the world, and speakers highlighted changes in the global missions enterprise while providing training on how to be on mission in a changing world.

“We have an opportunity now that maybe we didn’t have 50 years ago,” said Anne Burton, one of CBF’s Global Missions field personnel. “There’s been a paradigm shift. Thousands of immigrants are coming to us.”

The two services Thursday were power-packed with a line-up of speakers resembling a “Who’s Who” of missions. The afternoon session included Burton, Patty Lane, author of “A Beginners Guide to Crossing Cultures” and a consultant with the Baptist General Convention of Texas; and Dick Hugoniot, president of Wycliff Bible Translators.

The evening session featured BGCT Executive Director Charles Wade; Jerry Dailey, pastor of Greater Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church in San Antonio; Bernie Moraga, pastor of Primer Iglesia Fruit Avenue in Albuquerque, N.M., and coordinator of CBF’s Hispanic network; Ann Woolger, missionary among internationals in Toronto, Canada; and award-winning author Philip Jenkins.

Bill Shiell, pastor of First Baptist Church, Knoxville, Tenn., served as master of ceremonies at the sessions, and the featured musician was Dove music award-winning recording artist Bruce Greer, who debuted songs from a new compact disk, “The Mission,” which captured his experience on a CBF Global Missions trip to Asia.

Music was also provided by the Greater Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church Choir and the student praise team from Baptist University of the Americas in San Antonio. Actors from Tallowood Theatre provided dramatic interpretations of session themes.

The theme of the afternoon service was making missions personal while the evening service focused on crossing cultures.

“Missions is personal – at times, painful – but always power-packed,” said Phillip Williams, vice president for church and community development at Buckner Baptist Benevolences, in his theme interpretation. “The joy of my life came when I said ‘yes’ to missions.”

The evening session’s focus was on how to translate the Gospel into other