Youth Groups Need to Go on Mission Trips

More youth groups need to go on mission trips. I’m convinced of it. It’s not always easy or convenient, but no other experience can grow a young person in his or her faith as much as a short-term mission trip can. (I know that’s a bold statement, but I truly believe that.)

 

Of course, there are downsides to the “short-term” aspect of short-term missions.

 

If you’re able to take your youth group on a month- or summer-long missions experience in which your students are immersed into the elements of a foreign culture, great. However, most youth workers’ schedules don’t allow for such a time investment.

 

The increasingly popular (and unfortunate) choice made by many youth workers these day is to forgo the experience altogether. Since short-term missions are chock full of potential problems, the logic goes, why even bother with the hassle of planning a trip at all?

 

In lieu of a short-term mission trip, a church youth group may opt for a
poverty simulation (e.g. The 30-hour Famine), plan a local missions outreach, or a do a fund-raising campaign for an overseas mission. The aforementioned activities are fantastic; please consider finding a time and a place to do all of those. But please don’t misunderstand me when I say that they are not enough.

 

A corporate fast may do a lot to help a teenage focus less on herself and more on those who are hungry all over the world, but it will never cause her to truly empathize with the poor like sharing a meal with a family in Haiti will.

 

A local outreach may provide opportunities for your youth group to serve your community in amazing ways, but it will never upset their comfort like a road trip halfway across the country or plane ride to the other side of the world will.

 

A campaign to build a well in Africa may be an incredible way to responsibly funnel church resources to a need that well deserves them, but it will never change the lives of your parishioners like building the well with their own hands will.

Let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. We don’t need a moratorium on missions; we need higher standards for short-term missions. Let’s not give up so easily. Not when young people are capable of amazing things. Not when the world has so many dire needs.

 

I’ve seen the impact a short-term mission trip can have — not just on the high school student from the suburbs but also on those who are being served.

 

I’ve seen the impact of short-term missions in the eyes of Latin Americans whose church is being strengthened by a group of American teachers. I’ve seen it in the smiles of Taiwanese Christians who are being encouraged by the voices of a praise band from Minneapolis. I’ve seen the wonder and the gratitude of people from all over the world being served well by young people — people not unlike the students in your church’s very own youth group.

 

Instead of stopping the practice of sending our youth groups on mission trips, let’s expect more, not less, from our young people. They just might surprise us.

 

Interested in finding out more? Check out AIM’s mission trips for youth groups.