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Ever since I was little I have known missions. I grew up hearing about our church going to the Dominican Republic and seeing my mom doing stories on local mission work. Every year, the Sunday after the mission trip team got back, I would listen to the report and wonder if I could ever experience the humility that the team described.
When I got into middle school I started doing youth mission trips. They were fun, but when I came home nothing changed. There was never a BOOM moment. So I thought, "Maybe the BOOM moments only happen when you go out of the country."
Now, of course, being the preacher’s kid I was, I knew that was wrong. But something inside of me still hoped it was true. The summer after my freshman year of high school I got my chance to go outside of the United States on a mission trip, I took it. It was fun and interesting and I learned a lot about other cultures, but no “moment.”
Nothing.
I didn’t fall in love with a poor kid on the streets, or get brought down to my knees, or give away all my clothes. Sure, I felt more fortunate when I came home but that didn’t last long.
I didn’t know what was wrong. I was left standing on the stage with my teammates just being glad I wasn’t the person rambling at the pulpit about bugs and some kid that sat in their lap the entire week. I was glad because I didn’t feel anything.
I went along just fine through two weeks of Camp Viola, Mission Lagrange, Turn, and now Honduras – my second foreign mission trip.
In the middle of the Honduras week, I began to experience the same emotion as last year and I asked myself: Why am I not feeling anything?
Then I thought of something. Something that changed my outlook on missions. My entire life I had been taught that missions was serving other people and showing them God’s love through your actions. But regardless of my upbringing, my focus was on what people got out of serving others. That was my priority on the mission field. Yes, I wanted to serve them and give them a painted apartment or a cement floor. but what I wanted more was to get something out of it.
How selfish is that? Thinking that a mission trip is for you...when it’s really about everyone else but you.
BOOM.
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