Local Missions
At OCS, we believe in making a positive impact not only within our school but also in the larger community. One of the ways we do this is through our partnership with several area organizations. The Power Company Kids Club and Dutton Farms are examples of the types of partnerships we have.
The Power Company Kids Club
Each year, our school comes together to participate in a blanket and food drive. During a dedicated chapel time, our students fill food boxes for Thanksgiving dinners and tie blankets, spreading warmth and love to families in need. Each year we provide 100 Thanksgiving dinners and 100 blankets to families in and around Pontiac.
Dutton Farms
Dutton Farms is a organization that supports adults with developmental disabilities. Our partnership with Dutton Farms includes a charity basketball game that brings together their farmers and our students at OCS, creating a fun and inclusive environment for everyone involved. Besides the enjoyment it brings, the game also serves as a fundraiser for the programs at Dutton Farms. In our most recent game, we raised over $1,000 to support their impactful initiatives.
International Missions
At OCS, we believe in fostering global connections and making a difference beyond our immediate community. A focus on International Missions helps instill compassion, empathy, and a global perspective in our students. We currently have an annual missions trip to the Dominican Republic and we are committed to expanding the international opportunities available to our OCS students.
2025 Dominican Republic Trip
VALIANT
For several years I had the history of Gideon on my mind as something that I would like to study more deeply, keeping in mind that what I study I often end up leading in a Bible study at some point. At the end of the 2024 school year, I felt that God was laying on my heart “now is the time”-- and so Gideon: Your Weakness. God’s Strength by Priscilla Shirer arrived at our doorstep two days before we left for the Dominican. As I held the book in my hands, looked at that title on the cover, and then read the back, I knew that this message was timely: “[Gideon’s] epic victory actually tells of one man’s struggle with his own weakness—and the One True God who transformed it into triumph.” Ever since COVID, I have been more purposeful, and therefore intentionally vocal, about combating the lies told within the explosion of mental health issues. As followers of Christ, we are not to walk in brokenness; we are meant to walk in victory.
A key truth from Gideon’s life, as with many people in the Bible, is that God “calls things that are not as though they were” (Romans 4:17). However, while this reality rocked my world many years prior to COVID-- during a powerful “living room encounter” with the Lord in 2012-- truth be told, it took another decade for me to start boldly walking out what He showed me then… and, frankly, I am still having to learn that God sees us not as we see ourselves. But that is the epitome of grace, and therefore what is at the heart of “Valiant” and at the center of every Bible Study that I taught and every devotional that I wrote this year. I could not let go of one single, but crucial, aspect of Gideon’s story: The Lord, in the form of an angel, called Gideon “Valiant Warrior” while he was hiding from the enemy. God saw to it that I would be called Laura-- “Victorious One”-- decades before I even caught a glimpse of what that would mean. And shortly after we returned from the Dominican in 2024, God made sure that I could not let go of any of this. For that reason, what I thought was going to simply be the central focus of our Senior Class Bible Study this year actually transformed into so much more…
It became a mission.
Read the rest of the story HERE.
2024 Dominican Republic Trip
Undivided
Both professionally and personally, words have always spoken deeply to me. When I saw how impactful “S.H.IN.E (Seeing Him in Everything)” became during and after last year’s mission trip, I knew that I needed to pay attention to what God laid on my heart for this year. Very quickly after our return in 2023, I sensed that “Undivided” was what He wanted me to focus on in preparation for a new mission. This word encourages a “vertical focus” (our relationship with God), as well as a “horizontal focus” (our relationships within the team and with the Dominicans themselves). From these focal points, each day’s morning devotional then centered around God’s invitation through the book of James to live as “whole” rather than “double-minded” or, in the Greek, “two-souled.” Going into this trip, none of us truly knew how this theme would play out-- in either aspect of the word-- but by the end, we clearly saw how God drew us closer to each other, to the Dominican community, and to Himself. As a result, we have each been impacted in such a way that has caused us to see the world differently than we did before we left, and so now we long to bring a measure of what we experienced there back to our lives here.
Read the rest of our story here.
2023 Dominican Republic Trip
S.H.IN.E “Seeing Him IN Everything”
S.H.IN.E was Oakland Christian’s theme for the 2014-15 school year, and through my 10 years of teaching at this school, it is one of the themes that most stick out in my mind. This message was weighing heavily on my heart and mind after we returned from our last trip to the Dominican, and so I began to consider that this might be the theme for the 2023 trip. Last year our team discussed together what we wanted the theme to be, and so therefore I was slightly uneasy about simply telling them when we came back to school that “S.H.IN.E” would be our new theme. However, because I felt that God must have laid it on my heart for a reason, I wanted to obediently embrace this message. The team agreed that it was a great focus for the Dominican Trip in 2023, and so I proceeded with this motivation in mind. Slowly but surely, in combination with other things that God had been already laying on my heart this past year, it began to make more sense.
But little did I know when 11 students and 2 teachers embarked on this journey just how much the challenge to S.H.IN.E would impact us-- both as a team and individually.
Read the rest of our story HERE!
View our 2023 Dominican Republic Trip album HERE!
