When I went to Guatemala last February, I was not at all 'mission-minded.' I went mostly out of curiosity, because the Holy Spirit was leading me to go, and because I wanted to make my wife happy. (I knew she was starting to feel a leading toward missions, but I had no idea how strong it was.)
When I got down there I was overwhelmed at the need. But, honestly, it was something else that really grabbed me. Even with all the poverty, and all the futility - people seemed happy.
This was quite a mind trip for a person who grew up believing in the American Dream. It really struck me while I was standing on the roof of a church, in the dark, watching kids playing and families talking on their roof across from us. The idea that these people are different - different culture, language, economy, opportunities - it all faded away. What was left was just people. And, though they were different, they really were people, just like me.
And that was the start. After that it became easy to see one very important thing: I am not called to change these people’s lives by Americanizing them. I am called to give them the promise of Christ. While it is true there is mass poverty, trash everywhere, unsafe conditions - all of that is good to work on - what they most need is Christ.
You may be reading this and saying “duh, of course it is about Christ. If that's you, then I challenge you to go on a mission trip, to open up to the Holy Spirit when you are there, and see how it changes your perspective. If you are honest, I bet you will find out that a lot of what you believe to be your Christian values are really American values.
Christ is what is needed to change lives, communities, towns, cities, and countries. What purpose would it serve to comfort someone here on earth, but let them suffer after they leave this earth?
That is not to say helping people is wrong. One of the overwhelming things that hit me was how much we could do for the people in Guatemala to help their physical needs. Because of the prosperity of this country, we have money and opportunities. We are much less afraid of failure. Think about it - we get experience building things, because a lot of time if we fail we can go buy the stuff to try it again. That is a very different reality from a person who has one chance to build something. If they fail they have nothing else to try it with. There is no second chance. (And, that's assuming they had the resources to build it to begin with.)
So, yes - we are going down to bring an amount of comfort to the people we can reach, in whatever form we can. But, that can never overwhelm the fact that we are there to bring Christ to people. After all - He's the one thing that is universally and eternally important.
- Mark
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