In the Spring of 2006, I led my first mission trip. I was serving as a college / young singles pastor at the time and coordinated a group of a couple dozen students and singles from Oklahoma, Texas, and Kansas to drive thousands of miles to Bonifay, Florida in the panhandle (just north of Panama City Beach) to help renovate Bethlehem Christian Family Camp. To put it mildly, the place was an absolute mess. The area had just been hit hard by hurricanes Ivan and Dennis, and there was debris everywhere. Years of neglect meant that buildings were in disrepair and rusted equipment was lying around all over the place.
We got to work cleaning, painting, and repairing dorms in anticipation of being used for children’s ministry. One of the tasks I’ll never forget is that someone had donated a huge load of railroad ties to the camp- and our job was to move those ties around to form planter boxes around trees. These things were about 9 feet long and would weigh up to 300 pounds. My back hurts just thinking about all the effort we put in lugging those things around.
It was an incredible experience, as we focused on serving our brothers and sisters at the camp as a blessing to their ministry. Not only that, but we forged strong bonds of friendships, so strong that three marriages eventually came out of the experience. After all our hard work we gathered together each morning and evening to worship the LORD and study His Word together.
Fast forward 18 years to the Spring of 2024, and I finally got the chance to revisit Bethlehem Family Camp, for a quick getaway with my bride for her birthday. As I walked the grounds, I was amazed at how beautiful the place looked, and how nearly a couple decades later, our work still remained. A brief 5-day workweek had left a lasting legacy to bless thousands upon thousands of campers in the many years since.
Have you been on a mission trip like that before? When was the last one you were on? For me it has been entirely too long and I hope we can get something going as a church in the not-too-distant future. But what I hope for this weekend is so much more than to simply plant seeds of some future mission trip. What we are desperately in need of is to have a missions mentality. To recognize the mission field in our backyard, even in our own homes, and faithfully worship the LORD by serving others and sharing the Gospel with them.
In order to do this, we can turn to God’s Word, and specifically the mentality of Paul and Silas as they began their missionary journey in Acts 16.
I invite you to join us this weekend as we are challenged to follow God’s lead together, wherever He may want us to go. Our service Saturday is at 3:30 in the afternoon, and our Sunday morning service is at 10:15, where you can join us in person or online. Our Sunday School classes are on pause for the summer.