Maybe Bucket List Christians are the problem and not short-term mission...

AIL Ministry Executive Director
Dave Miller

Recently Noel Becchetti, formerly of the Center for Student Missions wrote an article titled “Why Most Mission Trips are a Waste of Time, and how to make sure yours isn’t” that was shared by a friend of mine on Facebook.

In his article, Becchetti brought up all the requisite failures we’ve heard for years about short-term mission and ministry, and they all start with our need...

• to control

• to define the ministry

• to see results

As someone who has served in short-term mission [STM] for over 20 years, first leading teams and then ultimately, receiving teams and participants, let me begin by affirming Noel’s list.

There are few leaders in short-term mission, myself included, who would not agree heartily with each of these issues. As leaders, and in many cases, pioneers of the short-term movement, we’ve been guilty of each of the offenses Noel cites, and probably more. Look closely at each of the problems mentioned and you’ll see a central theme... US! Broken, sinful, prideful, controlling people who have grown up in a world that tells us it’s all about us. Sadly, lest we get too puffed up, that includes our churches too. 

What’s encouraging is that in response to a history of at best lackluster short-term mission, those of us in short-term mission leadership chose to do something radical about it.

We looked critically at our mission. We examined our methodology, our ministry, our planning, everything. You know what we found out? Our critics were right. About the only good thing we saw were hearts that were beating for people to come into an eternal relationship with Jesus Christ.

And with that as a backdrop, we set about to change the way short-term mission was done. No longer would our mission trips be all about us, the primary villain Bechetti finds in his Pogoesque “the enemy is us” critique.

This effort soon came to be known as the US Standards of Excellence in Short-Term Mission, an accrediting and resourcing body for those who send, receive, facilitate and support short-term mission. Not only did we not want mission trips to be waste of time, filled with busy work like painting fences for the 100th time, we wanted them to truly be about God and His glory, lived out on the mission field. 

7 Standards were soon developed by the short-term community that literally address all the issues that critics of STM have raised for years. Unfortunately, not enough people involved in sending short-term teams are even aware of the standards. Worse, some people and churches have simply decided to reject them as too difficult to embrace. I believe Standard 1, calling for a God centered life and Standard 2, calling for empowering partnerships are the biggest stumbling blocks for large numbers of churches and groups, known as senders. 

Let me explain.

Standard 1, a requirement of a God centered life would seem to eliminate many people without a faith in Jesus. As logical as that may seem, this requirement smacks up against the desire of many leaders, particularly those working in student ministries to use short-term mission as an evangelistic tool.

What should a youth pastor do if little Johnny wants to join his friends on a short-term mission trip, yet has never made a profession of faith, or is not currently living a faith centered in Jesus? Should he be allowed to participate in the hopes that he might make a life changing decision as a result of his time serving?

Let me put that question another way. Should churches and groups be sending people on mission trips to hear about Jesus, or should they be sending people whose lives already testify to life changing power of our risen Lord?

Standard 2 clearly states the primary focus of your mission needs to be on those we serve. Focusing on those we serve means that our mission isn’t about us or our spiritual development. Sadly, that realty stands in direct opposition to how many leaders and participants currently think about mission trips. 

Recently I have started hearing from people, God centered committed people, that going on a short-term mission trip has been on their “bucket list.” Even a best case interpretation cannot find a way to interpret this as putting the primary focus on someone else.

There is no calling from God involved in Bucket List Missions. An understanding that a short-term mission can, or even should be reduced to some sort of ‘bucket list” of things to do in life is very hard to square with Standard 2.

If people are still struggling with even the idea of short-term mission, and the comments I see whenever anything STM is posted bear that out, then there is still work to be done. But maybe all of the fault does not lie with the short-term community itself.

Short-term mission is here to stay. Making sure STM is not a waste of time will take all sides of the mission experience, senders, goer-guests and hosts, working together to more effectively grow God’s Kingdom.

Noel Bechetti’s post raises some valid issues that many in the short-term mission community have taken seriously and strived to improve. The next step I believe, is for the leaders on the sending side of this issue, those in churches and other faith communities to also step up and accept responsibility for their part in improving short-term mission.

More on that later.

Practical Love in a Suspicious World... living Paul's words out loud!

Dios es Amor Summer Camp 2013

“If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.”

Apostle Paul, 1 Cor. 13:1

Thank you Paul, those are great words, but just what exactly do they mean in the real world?

That is the question many in the mission community are struggling to deal with as churches work to better connect with people in their communities, be they in Las Vegas, China or Mexico, where I serve.

It used to be that evangelism and showing love was understood as knocking on someone’s door and sharing the Gospel with them.  Whether that was through a program like Evangelism Explosion and their 2 important questions or a sharing of one of the famous Chick Tracts, saving someone from hell was seen as the ultimate expression of love.

Now we are seeing a different view as people strive to give their love a practical expression that was often missing in the types of encounters mentioned above.  One of the churches I work with, Dios es Amor [God is Love Church] in Ensenada is doing a good job with this.

8 years ago we helped this church, known locally as IDBEA, realize a dream of having an overnight camp for the children of the community around their church.  I remember the staff feeling overwhelmed at the thought of taking care of meals and programming for the 15 kids we had back then.

Now that little idea has morphed into a month long day camp that has almost 100 kids in attendance from 7:30 in the morning until 4:00 in the afternoon.  And this year we kicked off the month with a 2-night camp that was attended by over 75 kids from the local community.

You want to talk about love?  Hugs, games, exercise, good food, field trips, laughing, crying, caring adults and young people helping all contribute to an atmosphere that oozes love and compassion for the families of this little corner of God’s world in Ensenada.

What is even better is that everything that happens at this day camp is a result of the family of God saying to the community that we love you and we want to be a part of your lives.

Critics call it a social Gospel approach that seldom yields people praying the prayer, as if that is our sole hoped for response.

I call this approach, especially in a society that is wary of Christianity, earning the right to be heard.

You see, where I serve, the evangelical church does not have a very good reputation. People are suspicious of us, sometimes rightfully so.  Communities have been split, families destroyed and relationships abandoned.  What’s worse, these results are somehow celebrated in the evangelical church as evidence of a “true” relationship with a loving God.

I’ll admit, this approach is not for everyone.  IBDEA has lost some members because they are not more aggressive in trying to get kids to pray the prayer to accept Jesus.  And like a lot of churches that try this type of ministry, the change into a fully devoted follower of Jesus can at times, be painstakingly slow.

But it is happening. 

I’ve watched some of those kids who came to our first camp take leadership positions as they’ve grown and we are seeing families get connected to IBDEA because of this vital ministry.  I’ve also seen the community respond and offer to help in ways unimaginable just a few years ago because they see the church as a valuable asset to the colonia.

It has not been easy and there is still much to be done. 

IBDEA has to think strategically about how to better integrate camp participants into the daily life of the church and they need to continue their work towards financial self-sufficiency, but those will come.

Right now they are focused on living out the love of Jesus in real and practical ways here in Ensenada... just as the Apostle Paul would have wanted.

Missions, Art and the Gospel... bridging the cultural divide

Culture: the beliefs,values, customs, arts, etc., of a particular society, group, place, or time.

That word culture is such a loaded term, especially when we get into the church related world.  Culture, and the understanding of it to many, is simply a waste of time.  Our job, as Christians, as many define it, is to convince people of the truth of Jesus and save them from Hell.  

Leaving behind the theological ramifications of that, let’s focus on the practical.

Years ago I led a team of college and young adult people on a two week short-term mission in and around Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico.  Guadalajara is literally the birthplace of what a majority of Americans know about Mexican culture.  Charro, Mariachis, Mexican pride and machismo all run deep in this region.  Arts and crafts from Guadalajara show up all over the world and who isn’t familiar with the “Jarabe Tapatio” popularly known as the Mexican Hat Dance.

But there is another sub culture if you will, that is also strong in Guadalajara, that of Catholicism.  Nowhere else in the country, including Mexico City will you experience the influence of the Catholic church like you will here.

On one of our free days with that team of young adults, we took them to the historic cathedral in the center of town and later to the Instituto Cultural Cabañas to see the great murals of Orozco. 

What I heard from the group that day might surprise you.  I was asked why we were spending time in a Catholic church when we could be outside preaching to people so they would know Christ.  After touring the museum, a couple of people asked me why, as a missionary, I was taking people to see secular stuff like art when we were there to be missionaries.  

Grady Martine, co-founder of Adventures in Life Ministry and I made an important and valuable decision that day after hearing those criticisms and reflecting.  We would always try to make sure people on mission with us returned home with a stronger understanding of the culture of Mexico.  

We needed to enter into the local culture, learn it, understand it and live it so as to give our voices credibility.  Unknowingly, we were adopting a Hudson Taylor missiology.  

We believed then, and we still do, that to serve people effectively, you need to understand their culture.  For us, confronting culture, as many missionaries did then, and still do, was not an option.

If one of our goals for people returning home after a short-term mission with us was a better understanding of Mexico, her people, the issues facing that great country and her values, we had to work hard with our participants to give them cultural learning opportunities.

It was as if we decided almost 20 years ago to embrace Cultural Intelligence [CQ] that David Livermore has popularized recently.  He defines CQ like this... Cultural intelligence is the ability to be effective across various cultural contexts—including national, ethnic, organizational, generational, ideological, and much more.

These are the reasons AIL Ministry celebrates and highlights the cultures of Mexico.  If you visit our Facebook page, you are just as likely to see in our opeing banner a picture of the Guelaguetza or an alebrije from Jacobo and Maria Angeles [carved, painted wood sculpture] as you are a group of people praying.  You might see a picture of the ancient Zapotec Empire at Monté Alban or some of those colorful Oaxacan rugs from Teotitlán del Valle.

The Apostle Paul, in his famous address on Mars Hill spoke to the philosophers of that area, the Stoics and the Epicureans.  He was able to hold his own in that particular marketplace of ideas because he understood their culture.  He was a student of culture.

Shouldn’t we be also?  Would not our mission, be it here in the United States, or somewhere else around the globe, be better for it?

You tell me...

[To learn more about the culture, art and life in Mexico, visit Dave's personal blog.  All of the pictures used here are from davemiller.mx 

Is Your Mission Too Short? Decide to be Different and Stay Connected...

Summer is almost over.  The thought of short-term mission will soon be put away as Americans turn to back to school sales, football, turkey and Christmas shopping. 

And yet, the ministry goes on!

As people across America turn to other pursuits, those they have served the last few months will still be on the front lines of their mission, doing what they believe God has called them to.

For me and AIL Ministry, that means raising the funds necessary to help our partners in Mexico reach their ministry dreams.  Day camps, overnight camps in both Ensenada and Oaxaca, outreach in Guadalajara, a solar well in Oaxaca, fish farms, personal greenhouses... the list goes on.

For our partners, that means back to the day to day grind of ministry.  The kind of things that don’t lend themselves well to big pictures.  Smaller Sunday services because there are no gringos.  Bible studies for 5 or 6 people.  Little outside help for the worship teams and few visitors to break up the monotony of ministry.

In short, it is back to life.

I’ve always said that one of the weaknesses of short-term mission is that they are, by definition, short.  But they do not have to be.  We could make a decision to intentionally live differently and continue to impact those with whom we served for that one or two week stretch sometime over the last few months.

Think about it.

What if, as a result of your time in Mexico, China, India or where ever else you served, you made a concrete commitment to pray regularly for that country and her people?  How about instead of a huge Thanksgiving meal, complete with turkey and all the trimmings, you and your family decided to eschew the gluttony of that weekend here in the US and made a few meals like what you had while on mission?  Maybe that means a meal of just rice, or tortillas and beans, while thanking God for giving you that mission experience.

One person I know set up an account so he could help a pastor he knows get some books he needed.  That pastor mentioned to me the other day how much that meant to him.  I think it cost less than $20.00.

Even baby steps like these can help keep your mind focused outside of your bubble and more inclined to the people you connected with over the summer.

As short-term people, while our travels and ministries over there end, or are put on hold, our connection with people does not, and should not, have to come to an end... even if we never return.

We can, and should, continue to stay connected, and it has never been easier.

Yes, short-term missions are short, but they do not have to be.  All you have to do is make a decision to stay connected to the people just a few weeks ago said changed your life.

Will you do it?

Listening to Local Leadership... a step too often ignored in US short-term mission...

“Listen, and trust us!”

That’s it.  Four little words.  Four little words that, when taken in context, explain all that is wrong with Christian missions work around the globe and especially in Mexico.

I was recently in Ensenada to help a group in their continuing relationship with a local pastor and congregation.  As part of our ministry, we have been helping this pastor expand his small house for his growing family.

Wiring rebar castles in Ensenada

The next step was to make what we call rebar castles, wire them in place, set forms and pour concrete around them.  It is hard work, it tears up your hands and there is a way to do it in an area that has few resources available.

Now if we were doing this kind of work in the US, we would always use new lumber perfectly cut for the project.  In Mexico however, we use old wood and try to make it work without cutting it.  Frequently it is borrowed from someone else.

The pastor with whom we were working, Martin, had asked another pastor friend to come and help us out.  He and I hit it off instantly as we have both worked with a lot of groups and churches from both sides of the border.

I loved when he was watching me on the scaffold wiring the forms and he asked Martin how I knew how to do this work like a Mexican.  We talked and worked at a level most people never reach cross culturally because he knew, from watching me and from what Martin told him, that I was not your typical short-term kind of guy.

As the day moved on, I decided to ask him the $64,000 question; “Pastor Jose, what is the one thing you want to say to American groups serving short-term here in Mexico?”  Was he nervous.  So nervous that he came back at me with a question of his own... “Do you really want to know?”

“Of course I do" I answered and Martin assured him he could be honest with me.

And that’s when he answered me... “Listen and trust us!”

He talked about the incredibly big hearts of the American people.  He spoke of people having homes, food on their table and a saving knowledge of Jesus as a result of those big hearts expressed through short-term mission teams from the US.

But he also talked about Americans being taken advantage of unwittingly.  He spoke of gifts given in good conscience being sold once the giver was out of site.  He spoke of piles of clothing given to people that were wasting the blessing they received.

And in all of this, Pastor Jose spoke about how, if the American groups would have listened to local leadership, it all could have been prevented.

Listen, and trust us!

So often, for Americans serving in other places, that is hard for us.  I had to work really hard on this when we started Adventures in Life.  I still have to work hard at it.  This idea of trusting others does not come easy, but the benefits of doing so, far outweigh the difficulties.

Pastors Martin and Jose of Ensenada

Listening and trust are both at the heart of what the framers of the US Standards of Excellence in Short-term Mission [SOE] expect when we serve overseas on mission. As  missionaries, we are to establish healthy, interdependent, on-going relationships between sending and receiving partners, focusing primarily on those we serve.

The role that trust plays in effective mission cannot be overstated.  It is that trust that gives people the freedom to be open and honest.  Trust is what gives people the confidence to share things, even if it may be perceived as difficult, or hurtful.

Years ago I received a letter from a partner who was brutally with me.  A lot of his words hurt and were very difficult to digest.  I though this guy was my friend, and yet here he was criticizing things at the heart of my ministry.

I still have that letter handy in my office.  For two reasons.  First, because he was right.  Second, because he cared enough about me and Adventures in Life Ministry to say something.  We had worked together a number of years, had built a relationship and trusted each other.  If he was telling me I had an issue, I had better listen.  That type of honesty only comes when there is real trust between ministry partners who are looking out for each other.

Every year US churches send thousands of people around the globe to serve, trusting those to whom we send our people and teams to care for and lead them in mission.  Let’s remember that in doing so, we also must listen.