How in the world can you justify spending tens of thousands of dollars on a mission trip abroad when there is need enough right here in these United States, especially in our own Mississippi?
How can it be good stewardship to fly dozens of people to a Third World country when the same money spent here could make a remarkable difference in our own poverty-stricken territory? Isn’t it wasteful to send our own volunteers halfway around the world to do work that missionaries who are already there could do?
Good questions. Valid questions. Flawed questions. Why? Because they only look at one aspect of missions: the material cost. Yes, mission trips can be expensive, but the problem with letting the material cost of a mission trip alone decide whether or not to take the endeavor is a human one, and a mission trip is not merely a human enterprise.
Why do people plan and participate in mission trips? For one, it is in obedience to Jesus’ Great Commission: “…go and make disciples of all nations…” (Matthew 28:19), and, two, it is in response to Jesus’ statement in Acts 1: “…you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Most people go on mission trips because they care. But what happens once they are on mission is hard to explain.
It has to do, in part, with our affluence and lack of suffering. Most of us who live above the poverty line know nothing of true want and need. We get up in the morning and complain if the temperature isn’t just right. We get impatient for the hot water to start in the shower. We gripe about having to eat toast without our favorite preserves. We whine because it’s a bad hair day.
When’s the last time any of us were hungry — REALLY hungry? I don’t mean, “I haven’t eaten since 8 a.m., and lunch isn’t going to be until 1 p.m.” I mean, “I got a half of cup of rice last night and that was a feast! I wonder if I’ll get some beans tonight?”
When’s the last time any of us were cold — REALLY cold? I don’t mean, “It’s freezing outside and I can’t wait to get in front of my fireplace with some hot chocolate!” I mean, “There are more holes in this hut than there are pieces of wood to hold it up, and this dirt floor is covered with ice!”
When’s the last time any of us wanted fresh water and couldn’t get it? I don’t mean, “This bottled water isn’t cold enough!” I mean, “Will I ever get water that doesn’t have dirt and insects floating in it?”
Most of us, thank God, will never know what that is like. Thank God. Seriously. Stop right now and thank God.
And most of us will never see those things as long as we stay in our comfortable homes, in our comfortable neighborhoods, in our comfortable towns.
So when we take mission trips, whether near home or abroad, we see things we would never otherwise see. We meet people we would never otherwise meet. Our eyes are opened, and we understand that somewhere out there — sometimes just down the street and sometimes on the other side of the world — there are others, created in the image of God, who really need. They need food, they need shelter, they need clothes, they need what we can give them. And going to them can and will change things, and the most important thing that just might get changed is us. Having been where we’ve been, having seen what we’ve seen, having been with who we’ve been with, we see the world differently, and, hopefully, we respond to it with a greater sense of love and compassion.
Mission trips to Baptist Town in Greenwood, the Katrina-ravaged Gulf Coast, Uganda, the Dominican Republic, or Belize might be expensive, but changed lives? They’re priceless.
Want to change your life while changing others? “Go ye, therefore…” Go.
Randy Weeks is an ordained minister and a Licensed Professional Counselor. He lives in Oxford with his wife, Dr. Jeannie Falkner.
