Tell me if this sounds familiar:
A youth group or Christian college club decides to go on a mission trip to spread the gospel and serve “the least of these”, which is our calling as Christians. It’s short-term, of course, probably just a week, maybe two at the most. The students probably ask friends and family to help fund the trip, because even though they may visit the beach once or twice, it’s mostly to serve. The trip is to a third-world country, so you know it’s going to teach them to be grateful for their life in the U.S. They might be serving with a local ministry. They could build a house, paint a school, or hang out with kids. They might even get the chance to lead someone to Christ. They get plenty of pictures, of course. At the end of the week, they post them on Instagram. “I thought we were going to help them, but instead, they helped me,” is the caption.
All of the students come home with a “Jesus high” from a week of serving others and encountering the Lord. But, after a few weeks the high wears off, and life goes back to normal.
If you’ve known me for a while, this description definitely sounds familiar to you, because I’m just as guilty of this as every other kid who grew up in the church. I’ve been on several mission trips. I’m grateful for the experience and I know God has worked through them. But something about them has always rubbed me the wrong way. I’ve been wrestling with this for a while, even before I left for the race.
Um, Mackenzie, are you seriously bashing mission trips? Aren’t you ON a mission trip right now?? Didn’t you annoy all of us asking for our money so you could go on this mission trip???”
Yes! I did ask you all for money, and I am on a mission trip right now. And even though it’s nine months instead of two weeks, it’s still “short-term”. I will go back home in a few months and return to something that resembles “normal life”. And no, I’m not bashing mission trips, but I did want to talk about an uneasiness, or a conviction, I’ve had about them for a while now.
I could never fully put into words my feelings about mission trips. Obviously, this didn’t stop me from signing up for the nine-month-long one I am currently on, because I knew this was something God was calling me to. Although it didn’t stop me, it did influence me choosing the program that I did. The world race is very intentional about pairing with long-term and local ministries and making sure racers are well equipped and educated to serve in the countries they go to. All of this helped to ease my hesitations.
During our orientation and training with The Hope Project (the ministry we’re serving with), we spent two days learning their heart behind working with short-term missions teams using resources from the program and book “Helping without Hurting”. We discussed the importance of missions and our calling as Christians, but also the damage and hurt that some short-term missions can cause.
Take the example I started this blog with. None of those students that I described had ill intentions; in fact, most of them were probably really excited and open to serve. But try to put yourself in the shoes of the community they were serving in. If a bunch of students with probably no experience come in and build a house, it may make the community they’re trying to serve feel as if they can’t help themselves, which would lower their self-esteem or perceived worth. It may make the students feel like the community needs them, or create a savior complex, which just further separates them from the people they’re serving, and ultimately keeps relationships from being formed. And what about the person they led to Christ? Who will walk by them and disciple them once the group leaves a few days later? And the pictures may make for good memories, but if the students walk in pointing their cameras at every slum and starving kid, the community will feel like the students are making a show of them. Especially when their pictures get plastered all over social media, most often without their permission.
This conversation was a hard and uncomfortable one to hear, because I’ve been guilty of all of this. But it was also so good and so necessary. All of a sudden, my hesitations and uneasiness had been put into words! Best of all, we learned how to better live out sustainable short-term missions. My heart for this blog is not to condemn anyone who has gone on a short-term mission trip, but instead to start a conversation on how we, as a church, may go about missions better in a way that truly uplifts and serves our brothers and sisters across the world.
The first thing that I needed was a change in perspective. What does it mean to live out the Great Commission or the greatest commandaments? It’s not up for debate that as Christians, we’re called to share the Gospel and serve others. But, since when is a week-long or even a year-long trip in another country the only time and place we can do that? We don’t need to travel halfway across the world to follow these commandments. We can, and should, do it in our own communities at home.
Our ministry hosts shared a great example of this. They said they once had a short-term team come in and decide one day that they wanted to give their packed lunches to the homeless people who lived outside the community center. It was a nice idea, but it begged the question: would they do that if they were home, or were they just feeling extra generous because they were in a different country for a week? If we wouldn’t do it at home, then we shouldn’t do it somewhere else. Living out the Great Commission shouldn’t look different in different places.
Our perspective on poverty, and what it means to truly help others and bring about poverty alleviation, was also challenged. In my next blog, I’m going to discuss the practical ways my squad and I are learning to live that out as we work alongside The Hope Project. I’m so thankful for this ministry and their willingness to have hard conversations. God has been using it to teach me so much about living out missions now on the world race and even what that might look like later on in my life and future calling.
“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Matthew 28:19-20
Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
Matthew 22: 37-40
“Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.”
James 1:27
