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Belize Mission Trip 2006
"Why did you go on a mission trip?" It's the most direct way to ask something that many of us wonder about, though our questions are usually more complex. The one question touches on much: Why do you leave work and family for a week of hard labor? Why are you willing to pay money in order to do work that you should get paid to do? Why do you go off to some poor country when there's plenty to do right here? Why do you go with a group of people you don't even know? Ask anyone who goes on a mission trip, and you'll get different answers. My own conviction is that all the answers are variations on a theme: Jesus said, "Follow me."
"Follow me." Countless call stories from the Bible are variations on that theme: Abram and Sarai, Moses and the children of Israel, Ruth and Naomi, the twelve disciples. God in Christ says, "Follow me." We don't know exactly where he's going, and we can be sure that he leads us to places that are unfamiliar. He takes us beyond the borders of comfort and certainty.
Acts 10 tells us of Peter following Jesus to the home of Cornelius, a Gentile soldier. Peter knew he wasn't supposed to enter the home of a Gentile (unclean) and eat dinner with him. But Jesus called him; so, Peter followed, past the borders of comfort and certainty. When asked by Cornelius for a word of the Lord, Peter said, "I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him."
Jesus calls and we follow, past our certainties into places where God is at work in ways we couldn't have imagined. Jesus calls by means of a hunger, or a dissatisfaction, or a sense of abundance, or curiosity, or whatever; we follow, not really knowing what to expect, but trusting that it is Jesus calling. That's the case in the trip to Belize, where a dozen or so members, some "veterans" and some "rookies" go to dig footings with picks and shovels, then to mix and pour concrete with buckets and wheelbarrows. It's hard work. It's exhausting. It's exhilarating. We work in the midst of sugar cane fields in full bloom, side-by-side with Belizeans who then walk across the dirt roads to cut cane with just a machete. We eat the simple lunches prepared by the women of the Corozal church, and worship with them in their hot, cinder-block building. They tell us that we inspire them, that our mission reminds them that they must be in mission, if they are to be a church. So the poor church itself follows Jesus to Calcutta (to the church we're helping build), to the Conception Presbyterian School, a mission to educate the children of the area in a community of faith, and to Mexico and work among even poorer people there.
Jesus calls his disciples, wherever they are, and they follow, wherever he goes. And something happens in the following. We can't always say what it is; we can't necessarily put it into words. Maybe it's the change of perspective it gives us; maybe it's the way that our assumptions about Gentiles or Central Americans are challenged; maybe it's the experience of true fellowship across all divisions of language and nation and culture. Whatever it is, it keeps calling us back. Or, rather, it keeps calling us forward to the place where Jesus is going, which is surely the dominion of God.
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Click Here to See More Pictures from Belize. |
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