My Death in Life

The past couple days Moody Bible Institute- Spokane hosted its annual missions conference.  I have to say in the past 8 or 9 years that I have been able to go to missions conferences (or forced by my parents/school... another blog for another time), this was the best experience I had.  The speaker was entertaining and got his big idea across and the seminars were insightful, at least the ones I visited.  But it once again got me thinking about missions today-- What is the most frequent type?  What does missions look like with today's advances in technology and education?  What is most people's experience with missions?  What do most of these agencies actually want from us?

All of these questions led me to something that I hold dear to my heart but I also something that I have a burning in my heart against.  I am a cynic of Short Term missions.  And it is not because I read blogs or posts and base an opinion on those because it is the hip thing to do in contemporary bible school to hate short term missions.  It is because I've been on short terms missions trips.   But before I tell you why I am a cynic of short term missions (or STM from here on out) let me throw some stats your way.

In 2008, The Barna Group did a survey of STM trips.  Because the Barna group only interviewed the Americans that went on the trips, the data collected was from the perspective of the person going on STMs.  Despite my view on STM, this data is encouraging for it shows the eagerness of people willing to go out and serve outside of their comfort zone for at least a little while.


Who takes short term mission trips?

• 9% of American adults
  >> only 3.5% of American adults went in the last 5 years
• 11% of churchgoers
• 23% evangelical Christians
• 12% of Mosaics (ages 18-24)
• 9% of Busters (ages 25-43)
• 7% of Boomers (ages 44-62)
• 9% of Elders (ages 63+)

How do short-term mission trips affect those who go?

• 75% say the experience changed their life in some way
• 25% say it helped them become more aware of other people’s struggles
• 16% say it taught them more about poverty, justice, or the world
• 11% say it increased their compassion
• 9% say it enriched their faith
• 9% say it broadened their spiritual understanding
• 5% say it boosted their financial generosity  

[qtd in "The Truth About Short Term Missions" here]

With these stats I just wanted to show the benefit to those who go to them and to make a point that maybe STM are more about exposure of people to the cultures and situations that happen outside of their own church experience, rather than (greater) benefiting the people they go to serve.  Don't get me wrong, there are ways that STM is done well, mostly when the agency or church has a continued presence in the area they choose to do STMs in.  But for the most part, the greater impact happens on those who go rather than those who receive.  Whether this is true across the boards in missions is debatable, but in the area of short term missions the tension is clearer.

In an issue of Hard Music Magazine (HM), the front man of the Christian band Showbread, Josh Porter (Josh Dies, stage name), wrote an article on his reflection from a short term missions trip.  He talks about the experience of raising the money as the band toured and then being able to go and help out an orphanage.  But the thing that Porter emphasized was the debriefing at the end of the trip with the pastor that hosted the group throughout the missions trip.  The pastor had in some way made a statement about the cost of bringing the entire group down there and what that money could have been used for, but having them their to help was just as much of a joy to him.  But what Porter seemed to take away was the question of where is the line in going on trip versus truly helping the people?

That, I believe, is the question that is all too forgotten before we embark on missions trips.  We lack true reflection on whether we are actually helping-- are our missions trips truly acts of love and goodwill towards others?  This question is not an easy one.  To explain why I am a cynic and why this is a hard subject let me tell you a story.

The church that I went to in jr. high and high school was a part of this STM called Rosebud (now The Lakota Journey) that goes into the Lakota reservation in South Dakota and helps out the community there (to give you some background information, this reservation covers the two poorest counties in the United States.  It is also the Native American group descended from the people talked about in the book I Buried My Heart at Wounded Knee, which I would suggest reading).  We partner with a church and we do service for the neighborhood and congregants during the day and then in the evenings we gather all the kids we can and have kids club.  This was something our church did every summer and we had made relationships with the church and all the kids that went.  Many of us in the youth group would try to remain in contact with the kids by writing letters throughout the rest of the year.  It was a great experience and some of my greatest memories will be from that reservation in South Dakota.

Most of our youth group was connected to the biggest church in this town and would hold a kids club that would host 100+ kids the five nights it was open.  But I was a part of a small team that would drive further out into the middle of nowhere to this small community called Horse Creek.  It was so much better than the other group, but I'm a little biased.  We were able to drive in and set up for our meeting, but then we would personally walk around the big oval that made up the entire community and personally pick up every kid for kids club.  We got really close to all of the kids, which is the case for most people in situations like these, but I feel like ours was special.  There was one girl in particular that I got close to.  Her name is Yvonne.  The first year we went to Horse Creek she was 5 years old.  She would always ask to ride on my shoulders, she would hold on to my leg as I spoke to the whole group, she would hide behind me when had our water balloon fights, she told me about how her home was, she told me about things I didn't know 5 year old girls experienced.  I told her about Jesus and the safety and comfort that He could bring even though things were hard and didn't make sense.  It was always hard leaving at the end of the week and there were always tears on both sides, but it made those reunions the next year greater.  And it was strange how we were able to pick up right where we left off and get deeper and deeper into these kids lives.  That's what made it special.

My senior year rolled around and as we were prepping for the trip, the group that went to Horse Creek was pulled aside and told some hard news.  There was a smaller church that was joining the organization and they wanted us to take this year to integrate their group into taking over the kids club at Horse Creek-- this was our last year there.  I can't find words that would justly emulate the feelings for you here.  Not only was it going to be hard realizing that this was my senior year, meaning it would be harder to go on the trip anyway with the demands of college, but even if I went back I would not be going back to Horse Creek, to Yvonne.

When we pulled in the first day there was a surreal feeling hovering over our heads and that was before it hit us that we would have to tell these kids that this was our last year with them.  When we were walking around to pick up the kids we got to Yvonne's door.  I knocked like I had so many times before and there she came to the door, a few inches taller but the same as I remembered.  She threw open the door, almost hitting me, and then flew into my arms, almost taking me down.  We met up with the rest of the group walking around the circle.  Like every other time, she got up on my shoulders and I asked her how her year was, "It was good, but I missed you."  That was her first words to me.  That is how she summed up her year.  She missed me.

The last night that we were on the reservation our entire youth group met to debrief before we met for our nightly gathering with the other churches participating in the missions trip.  As normal, many tears were shed for having to leave this community that we love again, but as you can imagine there were six of us who were shedding more tears than normal.  It was then and there that I confronted a thought in me-- if the best way for these kids to get closer to God and create a more solid relationship with Him was without me, I'd hope that they would forget me altogether to leave more room for Christ.  The sorrow that I felt in having to leave Yvonne should not matter compared to what the Lord wills for both of us.

Here's the big idea-  I want to be a blessing and more of a help on my missions trips.  I do not want to be there if it would be more valuable for that people to send money instead.  I think our care for people can be questioned if we are not there truly for the people.  Are STMs truly caring for the people?  Is that the truest way to show God's love to that people?  In some cases, maybe.  But I'm urging you to ask the questions.   I sit here and I ask questions and take a painstaking critical eye to missions because I want to love the best I can.

So yes, I am a cynic of missions and specifically STMs.  And you can look at cynical me and shake your head and say in your head that I don't get it.  But I'm a cynic for Yvonne.  Because this is the best I can do for her, and all of those she represents, now.  So I will continue to do it.