VACATIONS WITH A PURPOSE
Our goal is to empower, encourage and educate local leadership and churches.
Our second goal is to provide an atmosphere where those on the mission trip can experience God in a new and fresh way. Some participants have come back spiritually transformed and others have been called into ministry. We have different kinds of mission trips but the core goals remain the same.
TRIP EXAMPLES
This is where we visit one of the most impoverished areas of a country. We bring a worship group from a more established church in and hold an evangelistic service. The last time I did this 50 people came to know Jesus as their Saviour. We then feed the church a simple snack and give away a bag of groceries to each family that will last them about two weeks.
The cost is about five hundred dollars.
Here we bring in medical equipment, medicine, computers, and toys. We empower the staff, encourage the parents, and have fun with the kids. Sometimes we make balloon animals and bring candy.
This is where we have a ‘pig-roast’ and a youth rally at the farm. Besides great food and lots of fun we do a campfire service and listen to their testimonies and challenge them out of the Word. The music is great. At one event we had 400 youth for an evangelistic ‘beach party’.
In many of the countries we are ministering women are not viewed as God values them. There has often been all kinds of abuse and marital problems. We bring in gifted individuals to minister to them and teach pastor’s wives how to minister.
WHAT TO EXPECT
Costs vary depending upon the type of trip that a group is doing--couples, work, evangelism, youth, etc. Price also varies depending upon the country the team is going to, the time of year, and cost of travel both to the country and within the country. All participants are also required to have the appropriate and adequate travel insurance. We provide each person with 10 lbs of mission supplies to take as part of their luggage.
Besides the costs related to the travel and accommodations every individual is expected to contribute towards the mission projects that will be the focus of that group. For instance, on a couples mission trip, we will “feed a village" and provide families with two weeks of groceries following an evangelistic service. Depending upon the nature of each trip a tax-deductible receipt will be given for 70 -100% of the entire cost.
ACCOMMODATIONS
The accommodations depends upon the type of mission trip. For instance, if we are taking couples on a mission trip the accommodations are four or five star resorts and the quality of transportation is raised.
However, if we are taking a work crew in we may be staying in much more rustic settings that may involve rent-a-rooms or even sleeping on army cots under mosquito nets at the site. We take every precaution to ensure the safety and well-being of all participants.
If we take youth groups along to do sports camps, DVBS, puppetry or evangelism we require proper chaperones and require the sponsoring churches or parents to ensure that adequate supervision is provided.
When traveling within a country we work with local leadership to ensure food, travel, and accommodations are reasonable, safe and healthy.
Our trips are intensive experiences and often have very full schedules, but we do work to incorporate debrief and decompression time into our trips. For example at one of our locations: On our last full day we often round up about 20 of our workers and join them for a leisurely day at a popular park where you can ride a real bull, canoe, swim, play volleyball and have a BBQ.
