For month 9, my team is living in a little fishing village called Tambo de Mora. In 2007, this area was completely wrecked by an earthquake. Churches collapsed, roofs folded in, and many people lost everything, including loved ones. While a lot of progress has been made in the last decade, the effects can still be seen.
This month, we are working with an older American couple and their church plant. They provided us with a unique opportunity— to create our own schedule. Normally World Race prides themselves on coming into places with no agenda and partnering with what the ministry is already doing. But this month, we got to ask the Lord how he wanted us to spend our time.
The overwhelming theme for this month: CELEBRATE. We felt the burden to spread the love and joy of Christ with this community, and remind them what it looks like to have fun!! We decided to host special events for the entire family. We are planning youth nights, sports camps, a Beauty for Ashes meeting for women, a community-wide carnival, and more. Our host is also wanting to support his church members in their own outreach endeavors, so we will be going to different neighborhoods for a variety of activities. It’s a bit of a logistical nightmare on my shoulders, but we’re so excited to serve the Lord and this community in that way.
We spent Friday and Saturday of this week doing outdoor children’s ministry. On Friday afternoon, some of us started playing soccer outside the church while others started walking around to collect children. We played games, sang songs, shared a Bible story, and even had a craft. On Saturday, we had doubled our amount of kids.
Around 30 children heard about the love of Jesus simply because we went outside. We didn’t have a date set up weeks in advance or advertisements all of the city. We just trusted that the Lord would bring to us who needed to hear the message.
As we created our schedule from scratch, I started thinking about how this relates to living missionally at home. Yes we live on mission at work, with our families, and during the day to day interactions, but would we spend an afternoon doing outreach in our own neighborhoods? Would we start playing a game outside, believing that the Lord would bring people to us that need to hear the Good News? Do we behave in our communities the way we do when we go to Peru or Rwanda or India or any other foreign country?
You may be thinking that that would never work in America. Or maybe you’re thinking that we have churches on every corner to do that. Well let me tell you, there’s a difference between a city that knows religion and a city that knows intimacy with the Father.
As crazy as this may seem, I want to challenge you to create your own schedule and go on a “mission trip” in your own city. Gather a few people around you and listen to how the Lord wants you to work. Maybe it’s starting a small group. Maybe it’s hosting an event for tired moms. Maybe it’s singing songs with children. Whatever it looks like, know that the Lord is wanting to work in your own city the way that he is working in Tambo de Mora.
We have to love the people of our city more than we love the people of our city thinking highly of us. And if we truly love them, we want them to know the love of the Father. So test it out. Make your own ministry schedule and trust the Lord to show up in His own ways. I can’t wait to hear how He moves.
