When you go on a mission trip, let’s face it, you have expectations. You try to abandon them all, but you never really can. Today was my first day of ministry here in Mokhotlong, Lesotho. I had hospital ministry in the morning and then “repairs” in the afternoon. The hospital was not what I expected. I went with two of my squadmates, Davante and Daniel, and we didn’t know what we were getting into. When we got there, we sat in a hallway in the hospital and about 20 people filed in. Our host’s wife, Tebo, sang a song and prayed in Sesotho (the language here), Daniel gave a short 5 minute word, and then there was another prayer in Sesotho. We were there for about 15 minutes. Davante and I only interacted with the people there when we shook their hands as we were walking out. Honestly, I left feeling a little defeated that I didn’t get to talk with people more.
We walked back to the mission house and almost immediately left again to go do repairs at the church. We had two other teams go out to different soup kitchens as well. My team worked on picking up trash off the ground around the church for about 3 hours. We finished up and headed home to have lunch at the ministry house. Over lunch, the other teams shared what had happened at their ministry sites. One of the teams got to share the Gospel with a lot of people and encourage them. The other team had their plans change on the way to their soup kitchen. They wound up going to a health clinic instead. They were asked to share something with the people there and, one of my squadmates, Dylan, got to share his testimony. When he finished, about 15 people stood up and gave their lives to Christ! Then, as if that wasn’t enough, God decided to blow their minds more. As they were leaving the site, a little old lady came up to them and asked them to pray for her eyesight, as she hadn’t been able to see for years. The team surrounded her and began to pray. After they finished, she said it was a little better. They decided to pray again, and once again, she said it was a little better. The team prayed once more and when they finished, the woman said she could see clearly for the first time in years!
Later that night, we went on a prayer walk in small groups. At the end of that, two more teams had huge victories as well! I was so excited to hear all of the things that the Lord was doing, but there was a little voice in the back of my head asking, “Why not me?” Why didn’t I get to experience a blind woman seeing again? Why didn’t I get to share my testimony and help lead people to the Lord? I was so excited for my friends, but so upset that I wasn’t a part of it at the same time. As I was fighting against these selfish thoughts in my mind, the Lord reminded me of something very important through one of my squadmates, Matt. Matt, like me, was on the repairs team and didn’t get to experience anything extraordinary during the day. He told our squadmates that he appreciated them sharing their victories because he was able to share in them.
We are not here to have a trip that meets all of our expectations. We are here to love people and to win souls for the Lord. I might not have been a part of the teams that experienced extraordinary things on their first day of ministry, but I was on a team that did good work for the Kingdom. I was on the team that made the church a better place for people to come to, by picking up the trash on the mountainside. I was on the team that cleaned the toilets so the children can have a clean place to go to the bathroom. I was on a team that honored our ministry hosts by helping them do something that needed to be done.
Ministry doesn’t always look like people being healed and giving their lives to Christ every other day. Sometimes ministry looks like doing the dirty work that other people don’t have time to do. Sometimes ministry looks like serving the people who are hosting you and going above and beyond what they ask you to do. Sometimes, ministry looks like picking up the trash.
