Nah, me neither.
But I am preparing for one this Winter. And on Friday I shipped off the assorted stuff that two of us put together to support a school in Belize that we’d visited this past winter on our trip.
I think that we sometimes go on a mission and then put it in the drawer with the photos we took. It was a great memory, but on to the next item. My friend Mark (Marcos the Cabana Boy as he’s known in Belize) and I had worked with The Cayo Christian Academy when we were in Belize. The trip was very special in that we worked with Senor Moralez in the computer room and did some work on his systems. We were hampered by the lack of tools that we had back in the states. Being good little techies we made a list of all the goodies we needed to make his students more productive.
As we strolled out of the door, and probably out of his life forever, we promised to round up the supplies and ship them back to Belize. Mark and I got together for lunch and purchased most of the list in the middle of the summer. It was the sort of items you need to network, expand memory on the computers, and do the maintenance that you usually ignore until it costs you a computer. It was all stuff he couldn’t get in Belize, or if it was available it was extremely expensive. I got the rest of it (after several email exchanges with Senor Moralez) and put it all on the shelves in my basement.
After missing the emails from the school’s principal on how to ship things to her I finally remembered that I was awaiting instructions (some days I drool more than others.) I emailed again, found out I’d blown the dates she’d sent and proceeded to pout. Until I read the next paragraph of the email. New dates!
Within 18 hours I’d packed the stuff and shipped it off. It should be in the hands of her stateside contact this week. And, God willing, in the hands of the computer students shortly after that delivery.
What’s the point I’m making? If you do a mission trip, consider making a long-term commitment to the people you work with locally. It’s great to go and speak to people, do a project of some kind, help take care of the sick, and countless other things they don’t always have hands to do in the organizations you deal with. But if you take the time to really find out how to help them grow, how to help them deal with things themselves, how to strengthen them, you will make a much bigger difference.
I’m reading a book right now called When Helping Hurts. 
I’m not done with it, but they have some excellent points. The biggest one is that we tend, in the West, to focus on material things. But poverty is more spiritual and emotional than material. The biggest part of it, from what I have read and experienced in my own life, is the feeling of powerlessness. It goes back to the whole idea of “If you give a man a fish he’s fed for one day. If you teach him to fish he has a way of life.” You give them the skills to make things go after you leave.
To use a word I hate, you “empower” them with your thoughtful actions. Money can fix most things except poverty. That’s why so many missions (and government welfare is just another misguided mission) fail so miserably. We throw things at the problem, not seek solutions. I think Mark and I have managed to avoid that in our actions. We could have just bought new computers, or sponsored a student for a year. Both would have been cool. But we worked with the man on the spot and found out what he needed to take charge of the environment and empower his students. He just wanted enough technology to do the work himself. That leaves a nice glow in my heart.
My shelves are empty of computer parts. It’s up to Mr. Moralez to do the work and grow his computer lab. He’s got a great start (smart guy with some pretty good basic computers) and just needed a little boost to take it to that next level.
Someday I’ll find out if what we did was the right thing. I want to go back to Belize and continue the work down there that we started last year. I have genuine affection for many of the people we met and want to be a part of their lives. They certainly are a wonderful part of mine.
Clive and Isaac, this means you!
The question for the day is: Where’s your mission trip? Is it in your neighborhood being an Ambassador of Christ to the elderly in the assisted living center? Are you planning on doing a trip to Mexico or Guatemala? And if you don’t have a mission on the books, why not? It’s part of the Christian package that I neglected for far too long. I want you to think about making yours a reality. So, jot down some ideas and pray over them today. Please?
