I've often wondered about the usefulness of short-term missions trips. Those of you who have done them and have thoughts about them, please feel free to chime in on this topic.
Here's my working thesis - I say "working thesis" because I have a very, very short list of definite ideas that I would defend vigorously:
Short-term missions trips are far more useful to those going on them than those to whom they go.
"Useful" is a tricky word, but I mostly mean the good that is had from some activity.
Do not imagine that I think that short-term missions trips are useless to those who receive the groups of excited teenagers, ready to make a difference on the world - but rather, that those excited teenagers are far more affected by the trip than the people who are visited. Which may not be an entirely bad thing.
But logically, it seems to take a lot of money, time, planning, and energy (on the part of the hosts who live in that country) to pull off one of these trips. So what is the benefit? Maybe some houses get built, which is amazing. Maybe some wells get dug, which is amazing. But I think for the most part, the change that is had is had by those kids who go on that trip. If all that money and time and energy broadens your understanding of the world, makes you sensitive to the gospel, makes you grateful for the freedom and advantages you have, then I say it's money well spent. But if that is the goal, I think any old world traveler can achieve that.
If short-term missions trips are to be of any use to the people who receive them, I think they need a reformation.
Stephen,
ReplyDeleteNice post. I share your sentiments about short term mission trips, but I need to do more thinking on the matter. Your writing has helped me frame the questions I should be asking myself.
I would like to see the line of thinking you presented developed a bit, refined and expanded.
I think the way you closed with a concise, matter-of-fact conclusion added quite a bit of power to the piece. Well done.
Have you read the book Bruchko by Bruce Olson? I think you would enjoy it.
I definitely agree with the I-changed-more-than-the-world-did perspective on short-term missions. Of course, once we get to glory, I think we'll probably be surprised about some things we did that we *thought* were meaningless...
ReplyDeleteJust an idea: a book that's a collection of of stories about how people were changed by missions but maybe had limited visible impacts otherwise. That would be cool. And it may be a good way to drive home the point that short-term trips should be reformed to more effectively impact both parties involved.
I think you are correct that the traveler is more changed (long-term) than the place or people he or she visits, and I agree that "any old world traveler" COULD have that same kind of life-altering moment of awareness. But most don't. Most travelers today (at least Americans, and most Europeans) want to stay in clean hotels that smack more of their home country or some sort of colonial era grandeur than the country they are visiting. And they certainly don't want to see poverty or suffering. They (we) work awfully hard not to see it in the world around us daily; why would we TRAVEL to see it?
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