A group of 23 Middle School students, some parents, and leaders took a mission trip to Jamaica in July. This trip was meant to broaden our view of who God’s people are and how we can serve them as the church. Our meetings leading up to the trip started with just getting to know each other and learning about Jamaica’s people and culture. Then we started planning and practicing our VBS program.  The VBS would last 3 days and we would do a skit, rec games, and small groups each day. Our week was laid out for us. Monday we would get to walk around the nearby towns and hand out invitations to the VBS. Tuesday through Thursday we would do construction during the day and then have the VBS in the afternoon. We had spent time talking about our fears and expectations of going to Jamaica. We knew the weather would be hot and we would get to love on a lot of kids! Everything else was up to God.

Expectations, fears, and planning were blown away! God knew what we were to do and experience. All we really had to do was show up and be available. This trip was not about us going to Jamaica to show people who God is. This trip was about God revealing to us that we are all chasing after the same things. We all want to know and feel the love of God. We are all battling against the same enemy who wants to pull us away from God. We are just in different battle zones. Jamaica’s battle zone is poverty. United States battle zone is materialism.  The people we met taught us what it meant to trust and rely on God… what true joy and happiness looks like. Hopefully we showed them that there is a group of 23 people who love and pray for them thousands of miles away that serve the same God.

I would like to share a story with you. One is from a  parent and the other is from a student.

Every night we would get together as a team and have some worship time and a short devo. Then we would talk about how we saw God that day. It was amazing how God was moving inside of each person on this team. Each day was a new experience of God opening our eyes to something. Thursday night was our last night to have this worship time. Friday we would have a fun day at a place called Dunns River Falls. That night we were in a very vulnerable place. We were all physically exhausted and spiritually full. One of the parents came up and said she would like to be baptized. She explained that she was baptized when she was 8yrs old. She went through a class at Southland about baptism and thought she understood. After being in Jamaica she has a new understanding of who God really is in her life and she wanted to dedicate her life to living for Him! Here is what she had to say about this experience:

“My husband and mom were both very excited. I love telling everyone about our trip and awesome experience.  It was life changing... boy do I look at things differently.  Now I want my relationship with God to grow more and more and look forward to it!  I want to see actions from myself and less words about doing it.  I want to serve everyone around me!!!”

What a great story.

Thanks for reading,

Caroline