Returning home from a short-term mission trip can leave a person wondering, What’s next? Veteran missionary Georges Houssney, who blogs at biblicalmissiology.org, wrote that up to 50% of short-term missionaries end up going into long-term missionary work. For the other 50%, what happens after a short-term mission trip has ended?
“One lasting impact of every mission trip should be a greater desire and ability to live on mission as part of our everyday lives,” wrote Patric Knaak in the book Life-Changing Mission.
Patric Knaak is deputy director of missions at Serge (serge.org), a missions organization that sends and cares for missionaries, mentors and equips ministry leaders, and develops resources for ongoing spiritual renewal.
Knaak is editor of Life-Changing Mission, which deals with how to process the long-term impact of a mission trip. This book serves as a mission-trip field guide that discusses preparation for a trip, contains a series of devotions written by various missionaries, and ends with instructions on debriefing from a trip.
Crucial connections
Approximately 1.5 to 2.5 million Americans have gone on short-term mission trips each year for the past 20 years, according to statistics published by missionguide.global and Relevant magazine. Each trip participant spends approximately $1,000 on a trip. In addition to the week or two spent in ministry activities and engaging with local communities, there is long-term value to investing in a short-term mission trip.
“In many ways, the real work of your mission trip is just now beginning,” Knaak wrote. “Finding ways to take what you learned and experienced on the trip and connecting it to your everyday life is crucial for all short-term mission experiences. Unless you are intentional about it, the spiritual lessons and passions awakened by the trip will fade with your memories of the experiences.”
Telling the stories and events of the trip will fill the first few days and weeks, but as normal life settles back in, the long-term impact of the mission will become evident in a person’s life.
“After my first two-week trip out of the country, I experienced more culture shock on my return than I did while I was away,” said Tiffany,* who volunteers for a missionary organization. “Foreign sights, sounds, and smells that were at first startling lingered in my memory with a sense of yearning. Familiar surroundings were now inexplicable. The first service I attended at my home church – although a solid, biblical church – felt like a carefully prepared presentation. I was gone for just two weeks, but it was a long time before I felt at home again with the forms, customs, and norms of my own culture.”
Tiffany’s brief time out of the country opened her eyes to the needs and opportunities for outreach in her hometown and gave her confidence in her ability to connect with and minister to those around her. Going on a short-term trip fostered a passion for missions that led her to volunteer with a local missionary organization and go on short-term mission trips whenever possible.
As Life-Changing Mission emphasizes, the short-term missionary can expect to experience personal spiritual awakening, particularly in three ways.
First, the short-term missionary will become more aware of his or her spiritual condition.
“I came to the mission field hoping to help others in God’s Word, and I believe I did, but I was helped as much as anybody, and I experienced revival,” said Ron,* who pastors a rural church in the southeastern United States.
As Life-Changing Mission points out, going on a short-term trip will expose a person’s strengths and weaknesses. For example, jet lag, overwhelming situations, or conflicts among team members can reveal such weaknesses.
“I felt like if I was honest about not liking everything about my trip maybe it meant that I wasn’t really called to mission work,” wrote Rachel McLaughlin in a devotion in Life-Changing Mission. “Sometimes we think that going on a mission trip will turn us into a super-Christian. But often it is just the opposite!”
Instead, Life-Changing Mission describes how a person can become more gracious and responsive to the needs of others out of an understanding of common ground in terms of spiritual need.
“It always seems easier to reach out to those who don’t know Jesus when we are on a mission trip,” Knaak wrote. “But the truth is … there is no us and them. There is only us – people who desperately need Jesus, every day, to be their Savior.”
Second, the short-term missionary will discover that, although time is fleeting, there is meaning in the mundane.
“I would highly recommend anyone who wants to see God move and see people hungry for God to go on a short-time mission trip,” said Ron. “I was in Southeast Asia for nine days, and it [seemed] like only yesterday that I arrived. The time flew by. The fun and exciting thing was seeing the hand of God move every day. Lord willing, I will be back, sharing the gospel and expressing the word of God with whoever will listen and whoever will hear.”
Because of the brevity of a short-term mission trip, even everyday tasks will take on significance. As Knaak said in Life-Changing Mission, “Learning to live fully engaged in God’s mission is one of the primary benefits of taking a few weeks to participate in a short-term mission trip.”
A short-term trip will bring home the realization that all appointments and all times are divine opportunities. Although the trip may be over all too soon, the opportunities will continue for God to work in every insignificant task and each ordinary person encountered in daily life.
“We can step into any situation expecting God to work,” wrote Josiah Bancroft, one of the devotion writers in Life-Changing Mission.
Third, the short-term missionary will become a prayer warrior with greater discernment of spiritual warfare.
“Every time a trip is in the works, something unexpected comes up that threatens to disrupt it: whether last-minute sickness, canceled flights, legalities regarding visas and paperwork, or financial difficulties,” Tiffany said. “Coincidences? I think not.”
A short-term mission trip will test and strengthen a person’s faith when he or she goes willingly into an ungodly and perhaps hostile environment, but it will also expose spiritual battles.
“Satan will not be happy about your trip and will do practically anything he can to derail you, your team, and your work,” Knaak wrote. “Use God’s Word powerfully to uncover Satan’s lies, and maintain your spiritual connection with Jesus.”
After a mission trip has ended, the short-term missionary will pray differently, Knaak suggested. Whether on another mission field or in the comfort of home, there will be a new urgency in prayer: delivering heart and soul into God’s hands, calling on His promises, and interceding for the successful spread of the gospel.
*Name was changed to protect privacy.
