Going on Short-Term Mission? 10 things you must know before you leave...

I recently presented a workshop at The Forum, an annual gathering of the Fellowship of Short Term Mission Leaders.

As an on field host receiver, I was asked to talk about short-term mission from my side of border, or as one who receives teams.  Here was my somewhat lengthy title...

10 Things Every Host Receiver Wants You To Know Before Bringing Your Team.

So here they are... think of this as Dave's Top 10 for Short Term Mission Teams...

1. The pace here is different.  There are not many places in the world where the pace of life is as it is in the United States.  Stuff just doesn’t get done here on the same time schedule as it does back home.  And that is not necessarily a bad thing.

2. Make it about relationship, not project.  Come to be, not do... And generally, you’ll get to do.

3. Adopt the "When in Rome" attitude.  Be a local... eat, dress, & act like a local... Learn the culture...Be an American when you return home.

4. Don’t overwhelm us with people.  We need and want smaller teams for longer periods of time.  

5. It’s not wrong, just different.... Corollaries... You’re not in Kansas anymore and You are not all that!  Just because we do it differently on the field does not make it wrong.  Also, things are different here, because sometimes they have to be.  Finally, and this is hard for a lot of folks from the US, but many people from other countries are not quite as enamored with the US as we think they should be.  

6. We drive the bus... or what is important to you, may not be what’s important to us.  You read that right.  The field missionaries are the folks in the front seat.  We are on the front lines so trust us.  Need more on this?  Check out the US Standards of Excellence in Short-Term Mission.

7. Don’t be critical with us.  Offer us ideas and support, but remember, life on the field can leave us feeling pretty fragile, and vulnerable.  We know where we are failing and coming up short.  Just like kids, we sometimes need people to come alongside and love on us unconditionally.  Be a blessing!

8. Think creatively when you give.  If your host receiver has kids, offer to baby sit so they can have a night out, or a day without the kids.  Schedule your vacation in a way you can take us with you.  Our finances seldom allow us a break from ministry and many nationals are reluctant to use what little financial resources there are for this.  Get a time share from one of your church members and bless your missionary host once in a while.  You might also bring a few I-Tunes gift cards so we can get some new music the right way while we are serving overseas.

9. We will still be here when you get home.  When you get that plane for the ride home, remember, we will still be here!  Our ministry does not just happen when you are here, it is ongoing 24/7!

10. The major work has already been done!  That's right.  The book has already been written about our great missionary focus and we know how it ends.  God Wins!  Praise Jesus...

After I presented this list, I asked a few of the other receivers in the room if I had missed anything.  They said I pretty much got them all... at least the ones we could share publicly.

That list is probably another post...

Want To Improve Short-Term Mission? Join Me At The Forum 2011

“Don’t worry, I’ll show you everything you need to know.” Those were the words of my pastor when I was told I would be leading the youth group on their annual short-term mission trip in 1990.

My training consisted of a shopping list for supplies and a map of where we were going. Once there, I learned how to keep locals from getting in the way of our mission, the subtleties of buying clean drinking water, and what to do when your group scares the local chickens so much they cannot lay eggs.

That was over 20 years ago and certainly many things have changed. However, too much of our short-term training is still based on a model of pray, trust God, and go!

Thankfully, through the vision of a dedicated group of leaders that included people like Roger Peterson, Wayne Sneed, and Gordy Grover, things are a lot different than they were in those early days.

In the mid 1980’s, a small group of leaders began meeting annually to try and bring a little professionalism to a then young movement called short-term mission. Over the years the group of people attending those annual gatherings became known as the Fellowship of Short-Term Mission Leaders.

I became part of the Fellowship in 2004. It has changed my life, my perspective, and my mission. There is no single event in which I participate that I find to be more important to the continued success of Adventures in Life Ministry and my mission than the annual conference held by this group.

As a leader I get a chance to interact with and fellowship with peers in my field. I can seek counsel, test ideas, and see where short-term mission is headed in the coming years. It also gives me a great chance to slow down and consider where I believe God is leading AIL Ministry in future years.

This year’s conference, The Forum 2011, will be held at Green Lake Conference Center in Green Lake, Wisconsin, October 12 – 15.

Our Keynote Speaker will be Robert Guerrero. Robert, the founder of Del Camino Network and an on field host receiver, is going to tell it like it is from someone who has received thousands of STM teams.

If you, your church, or your organization wants to improve your short-term mission, there is no better place to be. If you are a pastor, and your church is sending out short-term teams, you need to be here. If you have been wondering whether God is calling to the foreign mission field, a few days at The Forum can help you better understand that call.

Adventures in Life is better because of this conference. Please consider joining me and the Fellowship of Short-Term Mission Leaders this year at The Forum 2011.

For full details, and to register for The Forum 2011, click here!

Striving For Your Kodak Moment: Missing the Point of Short-Term Mission

I was watching as the group leader and his team worked on a project for a church in Mexico.

Having the benefit of many years serving in this type of ministry in Mexico, I have become accustomed to seeing the glitches that lay ahead for inexperienced people in my adopted country. I may not catch all the potential mistakes, but having made many of them myself along the way, I catch a lot.

Knowing the cost of materials, and how long it takes to get things done over there, I was concerned that they would not be able to get the project to point where the next group could easily continue.

I went over to talk to the leader and ask him a question.

Would he be willing to change what they were doing, for the good of the local church, so that the next few groups would be able to really move forward?

I was pretty nervous. It isn’t everyday you ask someone to set aside their goals for a larger goal, but I was amazed when he graciously agreed to my request.

I left that day feeling encouraged, and excited about the next few weeks of ministry on this particular site.

Until late the next day when I returned. Not only had they gone ahead with their previous plans, they had also decided to use the remaining funds they had brought for the church in Mexico as they saw fit, rather than how us “in country” folks felt would be best for the overall ministry.

When I asked him how they came to that decision, he sheepishly told me that the team felt they had to honor a decision that had been made at their home church in California about what to do. He then added that the people back home were “expecting pictures of a specific project” and he did not feel he should disappoint them.

Recently I was reading an article by Dr. Dennis J. Horton, Associate Director of Ministry Guidance at Baylor University. His article, Short-Term Mission Trips: Are They Worth It? raises the very question missiologists have been struggling with for years.

What struck me as fascinating was not necessarily the article itself, although he did reference Dr. Robert Priest, who spoke last year at The Forum, a conference I help organize, and who has done some great research on short-term mission, but the comments.

As I read those comments, a very important point began to emerge. Horton wrote about the value of STM on the goer-guest.

The people commenting were asking why the focus was not on those being served.

Dr. Horton had done what so many others before him had done. His initial look into the value of STM was from the lens of those serving, rather than the lens of those being served.

While not denying that those going may get some sort of benefit from serving cross-culturally in short-term mission, our primary objective should always first be the lives of those we are serving over there.

When we fail to do that and look for the Kodak moment, as the team leader in the story above did, we have failed, and to quote one person who responded to the article:

“[We have taken] advantage of an imbalance of power to enter other people's communities to gain these experiences and further [our] own agenda.”

How is that being like Christ?

The Punkification of Missions... Blessing or Curse?

Punkification. Adj. A word to describe what happens when a younger generation takes an established concept and adapts it to their needs and styles. For example, We are currently seeing the punkification of the church and her mission.

Great word isn’t it? Steve Moore of The Mission Exchange shared it with a group of us at The Forum, a gathering of the Fellowship of Short-Term Mission Leaders of North America.

Let me explain that term a little more. Punkification happens when the next generation wants to move on something, and the power structure puts up road blocks to that movement.

Here’s an example.

Jordan comes to you and says he wants to serve on the mission field. He tells you that he is sure God is calling him and he “just wants to go and serve!”

But you, being a fairly responsible deacon, elder, pastor, or leader, instead of being an encouragement, start to think of all the stuff he needs to do to successfully go and serve.

Finish college, get some training, sign on with an organization, raise money, etc. Before you know it, Jordan has a list of requirements that will take him years to accomplish. And that’s before we deal with stuff like tattoos, piercings, whacked out hair styles and clothes that don’t fit well. So he walks away dejected.

Or maybe, he decides to punkify the mission and the next thing you know he is somewhere in India where he went to serve the Lord and follow his calling.

As leaders, we are always in a sense gatekeepers. As Bob Priest pointed out at the very same conference, zeal without knowledge, from Proverbs 19, is also not good. So what do we do?

With modern travel means, the short, or even long-term mission trip is no longer just the domain of the established church in North America. Almost anyone can now get on a plane, and in just a few hours time, land anywhere in the world for missions work. The internet has also enabled perspective missionaries to make their own connections to local ministries around the world in a way that just 20 years was unthinkable.

The reality is that if someone feels called to go, they are going to figure out a way to make it happen. How can the church maintain a level of quality control for those missionaries, and at the same time, be an encouragement to those who want to go and serve?

Or, should we just not worry, commission and empower those who want to go, and trust that God will do the rest?

After all, that’s what I did...