A Local Church Self-Evaluation Regarding Summer Mission Trips

Someone once said to me: Our summer missions program is loosely organized at best. How do we tighten it up?

Here's how I answered.

You need to get back to foundational issues. To do so, determine the answer to the following questions about your program:

1) Why does our church have mission trips? (Write down any and all answers.)

2) Have all of your recent trips met the criteria (reasons) you have mission trips? What about future trips you are considering? If some do not, why are considering those trips? (Write down those answers.)

3) Can the main focus of any mission team be done by a group of unbelievers? Or, to put it another way, could a group of unbelievers (like the Peace Corp) go and do the same thing your mission team did? If so, what makes such a trip a mission trip? (That gets you back to “what is the reason for a mission trip”)

4) Is your church’s reason for having mission trips the very best biblical reason you can find in Scripture? If not, what is the biblical reason for mission trips? (Got to go back and look at the reason for Paul’s missionary journeys. What was the purpose for those trips?)

5) If your mission trip program has the highest biblical standards applied to it, will that change the way you do mission trips? In what way? What past (or present) teams under your current system fall below the standard? What changes are needed to raise the bar for future teams?

6) Are there any discipleship goals to your mission trips? If so, what are they? Are they measureable goals or vague generalities? If not, why not?

7) Is your church hoping missions trips will produce future missionaries? If so, then what discipleship goals are incorporated into the summer mission program that will help equip a future missionary? If not, why not?

8) If the trips are to prepare people to be disciples as described in Acts 1:8, what kind of preparation do your teams do to help equip them to reach the discipleship goals?

9) Can a team member who can’t clearly share his testimony or the gospel be an effective Acts 1:8 witness? What difference will there be between such a team member and the loving Peace Corp person or Mormon missionary?

Based upon your answers above, do you see you need to make some changes in your approach to summer missions? If so, are you willing to make those changes in your summer missions program? You must do so if you want to have a greater impact for Christ.

If your mission trip program has clear guidelines for developing disciples and equipping them for the ministry on the mission field, then you can’t do this with a “one trip open to everybody” approach to summer missions. You will need a progressive, multi-tiered program that equips people to be ready for the more difficult trip locations. Having brought the disciples through the program, the leadership will see who is accomplishing discipleship goals, what gifts become apparent, and who is ready to move up to the next level.

With a multi-level program in place, no one will criticize that some trips are not open for just anyone who is interested to sign up. For, everyone in the program knows that the prerequisite for going on higher level trips is doing well on lower level trips. They know that in order to go on a higher level trip they need to commit themselves to being equipped and gaining cross-cultural ministry experience on lower level trips.

Right now, your program is not really under anyone’s leadership and there is no consistent standard or guideline running the ship. Some trips seem organized. Some don’t. Some have clear ministry goals, some don’t. Most likely, none have any approach for what you want these disciples to do when they return back home.

So every one does what is right in his own eyes. When that is the case, it always leads to further confusion and disorganization. Then, eventually unbiblical ideas begin to creep in and become the focus. Teams go to have a good time. No one bothers to check to see if all team members at least claim to know Christ as Savior. Sharing the gospel with others on the trip isn’t in the plan. If it happens, it happens. We’ll work hard on our project. We’ll show them the “love of Christ” while we never get around to telling anyone about the Christ that loves them.

God is a God of order, not confusion. And there should be no confusion about why your church has mission trips or what you hope to accomplish through them:

You’re making Acts 1:8 disciples and preaching the gospel to all nations.