Most people would define a mission trip as a stay for a certain extended period of time in somewhere other than your home, in order to share your beliefs and make an impact on the people you come in contact with.
While correct, I fully believe that there is another entirely different way to look at “mission trips”.
I believe you are on a mission trip while you sit in traffic on the major highway on the way to your 9-5 job. That is your travel time and your ministry time is when you walk through those doors, your ministry time is your wife (or husband) on your cell phone, needing encouragement and a loving word.
Webster may define “ministry” as the “work or vocation of a minister” and Webster is correct in his vague definition. If we dig a little deeper Webster defines a “minister” as a “member of the clergy”. He is also correct in that definition.
If we as people that follow Christ are to define what a minister and what ministry is we must look to the Bible and nowhere else. I fully believe that you and I are both ministers and our ministry is whatever God has called us to in that season. I fully believe that people here in America are just as spiritually hungry as those in the remote villages of Africa and each one of us is called to listen and obey the call to go.
Will you answer the call? Will you go represent the heart of God on Wall Street, or in the back streets? Are you called to put on suit and tie and speak lovingly and patiently in a high pressure, high stress, situation with thousands of dollars passing through hands and transactions or called to lift the chin of someone who has fallen back into addiction and is passed out and slumped over on the side of the street?
Are you called to be a stay at home mom or dad, beautifully stewarding all that God has given you in your family, raising up children that know God’s voice and live a life that honors Him and others? Are you called to be a waitress, loving on the guests at your table or to be a construction worker, bringing God glory by how well you build that ten story building or a teacher that speaks into your students lives, teaching them as if they were your own children?
It is currently rocking my world that God has called me to the world race. I am not going because it would be neat or fun, (there will be days that are neat or fun and I may define neat and fun a little different than you) I am going because I heard Him say “go” and because of what I know to be true, I must go. I have had friends for the last two years that have done the race and asked me about it, and honestly I never even considered it. I told them that I wouldn’t even think about applying unless God said something. I have no interest in sending myself and I’m not looking for a fun mission trip, I am looking to spend my life in obedience and trust that He knows best. I have no desire to go if He wants me to stay and no desire to stay if He wants me to go.
What is He calling you to? Will you answer the call?
